The Street Singer
by Gunney
Summary: Post-Awakening w/o spoilers. Nikola leaves the Sanctuary upset, and without explanation. Helen and Will try to figure out where he is going and why. History Fic.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

_Old City – Present Day_

Helen found him in the library at eight in the morning. He was surrounded by bottles of wine, most of them half empty. He had, for reasons only he knew, seen fit to dirty just as many wine glasses in the process, all of which were scattered over the surface of one of the tables. There were books there too, most of them pertaining to history.

That was the first surprise. Having lived it, it wasn't often that Nikola showed interest in books that were written by the current generation about a past that they couldn't possibly know enough about to surpass his own experience. He'd taken some interest, once long ago, in a recent publication about himself but as Helen picked through the pile she saw nothing to do with the great Tesla. In fact most of the subject matter involved events shortly following his 'death'.

The inventor, scientist and vampire himself sat apart from the pile of books twenty feet away. He had pulled a chair to the center of the library and sat in it, leaned back, his head tilted severely so that he could stare at the ceiling. There was an empty glass of wine in his hand, its base resting against his thigh, tilting dangerously. Helen couldn't tell if he was awake or not at first.

She started to right the books, quietly absorbing their subject matter, her mind putting together a picture of whatever it was that the Serbian had been doing all night. She managed to unsettle a wine bottle while doing so and reached to grab it before it fell. Nikola finally responded at the sound of glass scraping against polished wood.

He sighed heavily and straightened in his chair, silvery blue eyes narrowing at her.

Immediately she saw the most alarming mix of anger and sorrow in his eyes, something she had never before seen from him. She froze, her fingers going numb. Had she still been holding the wine bottle it would have dropped to the floor and shattered.

"Nikola…" She breathed, asking a question without saying a word. Afraid to know the answer.

Slowly the 154-year-old stood and approached the table. With studied care he put the wine glass down, managing to find an empty spot for it despite the clutter of reading material. He steepled the fingers of one hand on the same surface glancing over the array of literature gathered on the table before his fingers slid towards Helen's. He grasped her hand, squeezing.

"I'll be going for a week. I'll be back." He said. His voice was nearly lifeless, his face so pale, were it not for his re-vamping, Helen would have feared he was gravely ill.

Before she could protest Nikola's hand had left hers and his measured steps had faded into the hallway. She stood for a long moment watching the empty doorway to the library, baffled, before hurrying after him.

"Nikola!"

The darkly dressed figure ahead of her didn't stop or even slow. She picked up speed jogging down the hall, catching him.

"Where are you going?" She asked, struggling to lighten the tone of her voice. She already felt panic in her chest but had no idea where it was coming from or why.

Though she was mere inches from him, keeping pace with his long strides, Nikola ignored her, as though she didn't exist. They headed past her bedroom and toward the main hall of the Sanctuary, passing Will in the process and drawing his attention.

"Magnus…what?" Will called after her, but she ignored him.

"Stop, Nikola please, and talk to me." Helen put more authority into her voice, tempted to reach out and physically pull Tesla to a stop, but knowing that the consequences would outweigh the benefits easily.

Tesla had his hand on the main door to the Sanctuary, the handle depressed but the door still closed before he stopped. He closed his eyes and tucked his head to his chest for a moment, and she could hear his ragged breathing.

When he drew in a breath to speak Magnus expected a shouting match. She was shocked when his tone came out calm, almost emotionless, and deeply disturbed.

"I'll be back in a week." He said, as reasonable as she had ever seen the usually flamboyant abnormal. "One week." He repeated, meeting her eyes before he opened the door and was gone.

She heard Will come up behind her but didn't turn, her eyes focused on Nikola's retreating form casting shadows on the cobblestone drive.

"Um…? You two get in a fight or something?"

Helen chewed at the air for a moment, bothered, clueless, intrigued and ever so slightly afraid. She turned to Will, her face tightened with confusion.

"I have no idea. When you've eaten your breakfast join me in the library." She turned on a heel and started back the way she had come, ignoring Will's reaction. Knowing he would eventually be too intrigued to remain offended by her brusque manner.

As she walked away she tossed another request toward him for good measure.

"Ask Biggie to brew us some tea as well."

She smiled slightly when she heard the sardonic laugh echo behind her.

* * *

_New York City, New York - January, 1943_

The hoop-huh-rah surrounding his death hadn't lasted as long as he had hoped it would. Of course he hadn't really gone out with a bang. A slow death, a poison that temporarily stopped his heart, a farewell note to the pigeons and the Nikola Tesla that the world knew, and should have loved, were it not for the bad publicity, was gone.

At first there had been a front page notice in a dozen of the major newspapers. Helen had been kind enough to bring him copies. Then the next day there was talk of funerals and viewing hours and it became necessary for Helen to send out notices, telling the world that the funeral would be private. No viewing hours.

Nikola wasn't interested in a day in a coffin under any sort of sedation, given his distaste for coffins in general, and even one day out of the public eye had given him a sense of freedom that he hadn't felt since the Oxford days.

"It's necessary that you remain hidden, Nikola. For God's sake it's only been a few days."

"A few days of hundreds, of thousands, Helen! I'm free!" The joy of it danced in his eyes as Nikola followed Helen into the main hallway of the safe house they had devised for Nikola's temporary stay. "No more disguises, no more pesky aging makeup."

"No more mustache?" Helen asked, smirking and pointing to the ever present caterpillar creeping across Tesla's upper lip.

Nikola grinned and spun in a circle looking for a mirror. In the reflection of the first one he found, the vampire fingered the stiff hairs, and then rubbed at a smudge of makeup that he had missed. "Yes, that can go. Change the color of my hair. Change my name. Oh the freedom to be…whatever, wherever. And you could come with me Helen."

She laughed but it wasn't the sort of laugh that meant she was agreeing with him. She took off her scarf, deep burgundy colored locks flipping into the air with it, and some of the strands staying aloft. Even the static electricity that existed between those strands of hair was reason enough to delight the, until recently, brooding Serbian. He promptly ignored her disapproval, rubbing his hands together as he ventured into the modest safe house.

"I have responsibilities. Not the least of which are keeping you out of sight until our plane…"

"Plane?"

"Yes, a sea voyage would take too long and provide too many chances for you to be discovered."

Tesla grumbled, his face contorting into a pout of sorts.

"They are perfectly safe."

"They said that about the Titanic." Nikola said and the look that followed the statement cut very closely to the skin.

Helen snapped her jaw shut, a tiny bit of anger flashing in her eyes. "If you were planning on haunting any of your old chums, Nikola, the answer is no."

"But…"

"You are leaving the country with me in three days."

"Helen, I.."

"No other options." She snapped. "Part of our agreement was that we played by my rules for six months, no questions asked."

Jerking his charcoal gray coat from his shoulders Nikola tossed it against the back of a whicker dining room chair. Even as Helen noted the curiosity of his sudden act of abandon Tesla turned his back to her and she could see his fingers busily straightening the small wrinkles in the fabric.

"You're taking all the fun out of death." He groused.

Like a weary mother with an incorrigible child Helen rolled her eyes at the back of his head before marching past him to the kitchen of the small abode. She had expected this attitude from him eventually, and had prepared for a little cheering up.

When she returned to the dining room table it was with large picnic basket in hand. Nikola had chosen to pout, leaning over the back of the chair in her absence, but immediately perked up as she pulled crystal goblets from under the hinged lid. Next came the bottle opener, a single white candle and candle stick.

He had started to grin as she lit the candle and she felt a glow of satisfaction begin in her stomach, the same place it always did. She pulled the bottle from the bottom of the basket and after a moment of anticipation, let the room temperature glass rest in his outstretched palm.

He grinned at her first, before he looked down to the label. The change on his face was charming and amusing. His eyebrows went up and his smirk disappeared into a brief moment of open mouthed awe before he smiled at her.

"1856 Crémant de Loire." He said, nodding his head.

Helen did her best to dial down the smile and handed him the cork screw. "The year of your birth," she acknowledged.

Tesla had just barely pierced the wax when he sighed, looking down almost longingly to the label. "87 years old."

They shared a moment of silence, both thinking over the period of time. How many wonders and horrors had Helen Magnus and Nikola Tesla, along with James Watson, Nigel Griffith and…and John, how many indescribable things had they been witness to? How many more would they be?

"It's been…" Nikola brought the bottle of wine closer to his chest, absently working the cork screw as he thought. "About six decades since I've seen the homeland."

"Serbia?" Helen asked, leaning across the table with the crystal in hand, setting it close to the vampire.

With only a small measure of his strength, Tesla was able to pull the cork free. He tested it, allowing Magnus to do the same before setting it to the side.

While the wine was allowed to breathe, Nikola began to calculate. "Would it break our agreement if the country I returned to was my homeland instead of yours?"

Tesla poured, a small sample splashing into each of the shallow goblets before he set the bottle down. Helen raised her glass and rounded the table, her eyes narrowed, a suspiciously surprised look coloring her cheeks.

"I hardly trust you to go there on your own."

"You are more than welcome to accompany me.."

The same look of mother to child and Helen thought on it more, her goblet held aloft.

"Maybe.." She said finally, and Nikola grinned, tapping their glasses together.

As the clear tone rang out he toasted, "Here's to maybe."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

_Old City – Present Day_

"You're sure he didn't say anything?"

"Will…he said nothing. There wasn't time. You saw the majority of the conversation." Helen shook her head flipping through the few tomes that she had closed, wishing she had left them open to their original pages.

Across the room Will shook his head, his hands on his hips projecting a mild sense of frustration. Helen knew the feelings that the vampire and inventor aroused in her staff but would quickly admit that the most level headed of them was Will Zimmerman. She couldn't have chosen a better companion to join her on this rabbit trail of an expedition.

"Yeah and it looked an awful lot like Tesla heading out to create havoc again." Will reached into the gaping hole that had been left on one of the shelves. Half the books scattered on the table had come from that one area and he had noticed the void. His first reaction was that Tesla had hidden something in the wall behind the books, or that there was some other secret part to the Sanctuary that only the vampire knew about, some dastardly invention hidden until the great mind deigned the time right for its unveiling. The shelf was well above his eye level but probably even with that of the tall Serbian. Will felt around the back of the shelf a little longer, contacting only the grain of the wood and the smooth gloss of the varnish.

"Nothin'" He muttered disappointedly to himself.

Helen smiled grimly across the room. She had to allow Will his suspicions. On the one hand it was the only way for him to learn the ropes of running the Sanctuary. On the other she had begun to admit in the last few years that there were allowances she had made for Nikola when James passed, that she would never have done previously. He was still a genius, and at the current time, still a vampire. Perhaps not a threat anymore, but not a kitten either.

"Clearly he spent the night here, and with a focus on the period of history following his passing in Manhattan." She surveyed the books around her. At the top of the pile was a book of maps with a page open to Serbia, but the old Serbia. The book had been published in 1932. In the same book she had found fresh wine stains splashed across Poland, Germany, France and Russia.

Near that there were several books on the early part of World War II. The invasion of Poland and France. A copy of Mein Kopf had been discarded across the length of the table so that it was teetering precariously at the edge, the bottom cover creased in the corner.

There was a New York Times publication that she recognized. She had bought it the year it was published almost a decade ago. Setting her teeth together she knew what she would find as she unearthed the book. It wasn't the exact page, but it only took her moments to find the copy of the news articles that declared the death of Nikola Tesla.

"Huh." She said, catching Will's attention.

"Yeah?" He asked, now exploring another smaller gap in the stacks.

"We've got a time period." Helen said, testing her theory as she flipped through some of the other books near her. She turned back to the page the New York Times anthology had been opened to. "1943 to 1950, or thereabouts."

"Okay so, that explains the WWII fetish."

"He was in Serbia then, or planning to be anyway."

"Wait a minute…I thought." Will's voice faded for a moment and Helen routed deeper into the pile as she waited for his thoughts to form. "I thought Tesla was in Portsmouth in 1944?"

"Yes, he was. But his interest in the war didn't begin immediately. In fact.." Helen paused, her hands uncovering a small glossy volume buried under a stack of Churchill's publications.

It was relatively new, compared to the other works and had not had its spine creased until Nikola pulled it from the shelves. It had been published by a little known company in London, cleverly including 'illustrated' in the title in one of many attempts at reviving its readership. It was a simple book of black and white photographs labeled as the most shocking crime photos of the 20th century. The page the book immediately opened to showed a full view of a hole in the ground, more precisely an underground chamber with a concrete cover. Around that hole was a scattering of men in hats and winter coats, staring down at the chamber, horrified.

The caption told her that the photo was of a secret gas chamber in the private surgery of a physician in France. Posing as a part of the resistance during World War II he had lured Jews to the chamber, promising that he would help them escape Nazi clutches. Once they were sequestered away in the chamber, thinking that they need only wait a few hours before the guides to their freedom came for them, the surgeon turned on his own supply of toxic gasses and watched them die through a small viewing portal in the cover.

Helen set the book down slowly on the table and closed her eyes, memories and their powerful emotional companions flooding through her unbidden. She had only seen one death camp and it had been well after the residents were removed and the war had ended. She had agreed to oversee the moving of remains, primarily because of the rumors that the camp in question had held the highest concentration of captured abnormals imprisoned during the war. Even with the buildings emptied and the grounds cleared, months of rain and weather washing away some of the spilled blood, the camp had been terrorizing.

It had left a lasting impression on her that even now caused tears to spring to her eyes.

She had completely forgotten that Will was in the room up until his hand landed on her arm, concern on his face.

"Hey…" He said softly before he moved so he could see the book. "Oh."

Helen wiped at her face, smiling a little through the pain that had hit her like a ton of bricks.

"It was a hard time. There were so many monsters, disguised as good people." She said softly, not bothering to disguise the pain in her voice, before she walked away to find something to wipe her face.

"Do you think this is where he's headed? Um…" Will looked closer at the caption. "France?"

Helen scraped at the tears, grateful that she had decided against mascara that morning. She moved back to where Will stood and shook her head. "No, no there's more here. That's only a small part of it."

Will paused a moment then asked, "What does that mean?"

Helen crossed her arms, took a breath and said, "It means we'll need more tea."

* * *

_London Sanctuary – January, 1943_

"You must be joking."

Helen jumped slightly at the force of James' exclamation and creased her brow in confusion. She hadn't expected her news to start so passionate a reaction in Watson and it took her a moment to backtrack through what she had said. To find the ignition that had set him off.

"The man's life is changing dynamically, James. He's been forced to leave behind everything he's ever cared about, including his entire estate, which by the way has been claimed by the Alien Property Custodian of the FBI."

"Alien Property…? I thought he'd earned his American citizenship ages ago." James' clever eyes narrowed, a curious smirk arching his mouth. After a moment of thought he turned back to the expanse of slate he'd been scribbling on.

"He's not happy about it.." Helen said, critically eyeing the logical proofs for errors even as she considered the Serbian who was supposedly resting in his room two floors above them.

"So we're pitying him." James clarified, tapping words onto the board before him in a rapid moment of clarity before his hand paused again.

"Humoring, perhaps. I thought this would be better than letting him return to America to hunt down and steal back his property. He would like to return to his homeland. Given that his family is dead and very few there would recognize him for who he is, I don't see the harm."

"He wasn't even born in Serbia."

Helen pursed her lips and stepped closer to James. Immediately his arm wrapped around her waist comfortably and she laid her head against his shoulder, her eye lids sinking a bit. She took in his familiar scent and felt a rush of warmth go through her. They stayed that way for a long time, James' chin coming to rest against the pile of red hair coifed on her head.

"I think it's necessary. He needs to adjust. He has promised to keep in contact-"

James interrupted her with a disbelieving scoff and she raised her head from his shoulder, her hand grasping his chin to stop him. "Just this once, James."

The proximity of their faces, the touch of her hand, led smoothly and quickly into a kiss. It was quiet and stilling and promised of things to come. When they broke apart they were silent, communicating wordlessly before James spoke.

"You trust him?"

"To look after himself and his own interests? Yes. I do."

They shared a look, James acquiesced to her judgment and she reluctantly stepped away.

She had nearly left the room, intending to assist Nikola in his effort to leave the country when she paused in the doorway. "You know he asked me to accompany him."

Watson said nothing, for all appearances intent on the board of theorems.

Disappointed she began to leave, almost hurt by his silence until she heard his voice drift after her down the hall. "Next he'll want to be King of England."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

_Present Day – Old City_

Helen grasped the thick binder and pulled it from its place on the shelf. The action required some muscle. Time had secured the thick folder to the wood and she hadn't been in the room, much less considered dusting it, in over a year. Turning precariously on the ladder she had to tip the binder a bit to hand it down to Will. When she did he was bombarded by a collection of dead bug carcasses. He managed to shield his eyes in time, but she winced at the large bee that landed in his hair.

"You know I'm not surprised that there are still rooms in this Sanctuary that I've never been in." Will said, brushing his hair clean of corpses. "I'm also not so surprised that those rooms would have to be dedicated to the storage of all the stuff you've collected over the years."

Helen grit her teeth grimly, working on freeing another binder while she waited for the punch line. She had turned to hand it down to Will when he said, "I _am_ surprised that you have whole binders of stuff dedicated to Tesla."

Helen gave a short laugh. "You should see James' collection…"

"Yes but, these aren't damage reports, or a list of complaints."

Helen agreed with him by shaking her head, reaching for the third binder. There were about forty-two of them but she only needed that period of time. She kept the last one in hand, slowly climbing back down the ladder.

The room had been one of many guest rooms until she had moved a dozen shelving units into it, setting them up with aisles no wider than four feet. Enough room to get between them with a ladder if need be. Shelf space was necessary before the age of computers. She had made some effort at the turn of the 21st century to scan and catalogue as much of the Sanctuary's daily paper load digitally, thus reducing the need for storage space and doing what she could to preserve the planet for the sake of the abnormals she was also preserving.

Some things, however, had neither the necessity of scanning, nor the lack of value that would allow them to be thrown away.

"So what are they?" Will asked, carrying the first two binders toward the door. There was no space amongst the shelves to set anything down, much less sit. Helen had expected to do the reading alone in her bed room, thinking that by now Will would have lost interest and gone on to other Sanctuary activities. She supposed it was the profiling aspect of their investigation that attracted him.

She followed Will out of the room, leading the way down the hall, back to the library.

"Check stubs?" Will guessed.

Helen smirked but kept walking.

"A list of wines that he's stolen?"

She shook her head, smiling again, brushing at the dust on the cover of the binder in her arms as she closed the distance to the library doors.

"Oh..I know. Letters to Edison, right? Angry ones?"

"Close." She said, pulling the doors open and walking into the giant room.

"Letters…to…" Will set the binders down on the table they had been working at. He was mere seconds from opening the top binder when his eyes widened and his mouth formed a perfect 'o'. "Letters to you. _Forty-two_ binders full of letters written to you." He emphasized.

Helen shrugged, blushing despite herself and set her own burden down as well. "He has always been a talented writer, Will."

"Uh…yeah. On that topic, I read his autobiography.."

Helen giggled, and then desperately sobered.

"Yeah…that was me, the whole way through." Will said, pointing a finger at her, looking briefly astounded. "You were right; he did write it in third person."

"Remind me to show you his diary."

"Alright…so we have binders full of letters from Mr. Sanguine Vampiris Alone-iss. What now?"

"Start with February of 1943 and skim." Helen said, opening her own binder. She had the years 1948 to 1950. Each letter, postcard or cable had been carefully laminated in thick plastic before it was placed on the three rings, guarding against the ravages of time as well as the possibility of fire or flood. If it was possible to save the things that she cherished, instead of needed, she would and had put forth the effort.

"I always figured he'd have messy handwriting." Will said, flipping through the pages, pausing from time to time.

"Working out a problem on a chalkboard yes, but…when it came to his letters, Nikola was fastidious. He loved language."

"Okay…here's February 3rd. My Dear Helen, How I wish you had decided to join me on my long overdue pre-reg-grin-ation. Uh…As I boarded the train I marveled at the sleek design so cleverly resembling that of the rocket to the moon in Jule's finest work…Jules? As in..Jules Verne?" Will asked, looking up.

Helen nodded, her eyebrows lifting a little before she waited expectantly.

"Uh…I like the train, I _really_ like the train…" Will said, clearly paraphrasing. "I shall not be mailing this letter to you myself. I have found the fellow on board that works primarily in the baggage car and he has agreed to slip my missive into the bag with no exorbitant cost. I find the current cost of mailing to be appalling. It is with regret that I leave my fair America…_his_ fair America?"

Helen smiled, and then shrugged, her head bent to the binder in front of her again.

"…that I leave my fair America behind to thieves and butchers, but ahead I see the familiar dawning of the sun of Serbia…then some stuff about his travel plans and…ah yes. With endearing fondness, Nikola Tesla."

* * *

_Belgian Resistance Head Quarters_

_Breskens, Netherlands_

_February 1943_

Nikola finished the letter, daubing the wet tip of his pen on the napkin at his knee before laying a sheet of paper over his words and carefully pressing down. Thanks to his vampiric, and thus steady hand, each of the characters were perfectly formed, the lines straighter than a razor's edge. His vampirism had been such a boon to his need for consistency and perfection. But the only place he could really show it was through his letters to Helen.

In the cool of the dank tavern cellar there had been nothing to do but drink for hours and even with his fondness for French wine, despite the curious Belgian twist, his mind had grown stagnate. He'd written three letters before crafting this one. Once the ink had dried he folded it perfectly into thirds with the beginning of his missive showing on the outside instead of being folded inward. He slipped the precise and crisp rectangle into the envelope, pre-addressed. No return address or it wouldn't make it out of occupied Belgium, and there really was no point in addressing it.

Helen thought he was in Denmark, avoiding the crush of the German invasion and going around them to his place of birth. Croatia, and even Serbia, might have been an enjoyable destination after all, if it hadn't been for his other plans.

"How many times do you write ze letter before you send it?" The heavily accented voice whispered from the shadows.

Tesla's mouth quirked upward. He'd already answered the questions about his slight accent, about his ability to speak French, the Belgian variant (Though his Flemish was deplorable) and Dutch, as well as German. He'd explained how it was that he could see well enough to write endless letters in the near pitch black of their hidey hole and once more confirmed for the collection of ten freedom fighters that he was a vampire. And that it was his vampirism that ultimately landed him this deal.

A new question was a blessing.

"This one will go out." He replied, speaking in English at Dane's insistence. He wanted to go to America when Belgium was free, Dane had said, and needed help with the language. Tesla thought about telling him that the Queen's English disappeared in that fabled country of milk and honey but he knew he would be the only one to appreciate the humor and decided against it.

"To your amour, oui?" Dane asked, bright brown eyes twinkling drunkenly in the dark. The fact that Dane was drunk at all was a testament to how long they had been hiding. Raised in a country where children began drinking wine at the dinner table at the age of five, it took quite a bit to slur Dane's speech, but it was necessary to cut the cheese and course artisan bread with something.

Tesla sighed, grinning brightly. The memory of Helen always brought that grin to his face. Of course her memory was slightly tainted with the realization that he was yet again deceiving her. But this time it was for a good cause. It was, in part, for his lady science. Death hadn't been nearly as lucrative as he had hoped, and while preparing for it, this mildly mercenary opportunity cropped up.

The Belgian army had always been small and desperate, willing to take anyone from anywhere so long as they wore the uniform and faced the enemy. Most often the cold blooded killers were good for the Belgian cause. In this case, however they had wanted what they felt was impossible.

An indestructible, deceptive, powerful and intelligent spy to infiltrate, take pictures, memorize information and schematics and return it all, intact, to the resistance fighters sequestered everywhere; in this case the group of thirty women and ten men using a sea side tavern as headquarters.

Tesla was convinced that the envelope that had been slid under his door at The New Yorker in September of 1942 had been placed there in error. It was not addressed to him, but to the Hotel, nor was there was a room number. The letter inside it was not addressed specifically either. It was a communique, heavily disguised and coded, from one branch of the underground resistance to the other. Declaring a list of proposed missions. Most of them pertained to slowing workers in the factories; delaying feeding the Nazi war machine by getting every mechanic to turn his wrench at half the speed, or to put a faulty washer on the occasional nut. The one mission that stood out had a hefty reward attached to it.

The numbers had been what drew Nikola to the musty room. Given his current location he found it laughable that he would ever see the money. He might have been willing to admit that there was a more altruistic attraction to the job. He might have called it a sight-seeing trip.

As he set his writing utensils to the side and slid the sealed envelope into a sheath of treated leather he decided it didn't matter what he called it. He was, for now, dedicated to that which he had promised to do.

Above their heads the rumble of conversation, drunken revelry and bawdy music continued. Around him darkly clad men ranging in age from (despite their denials and insistence that they were of age)fifteen to twenty-two slept fitfully or sat sniffling in the quiet. Some were drinking, others gnawing at hardened day old bread. One of them, Johannes, sat in the corner with an oil cloth, endlessly polishing a Luger that he claimed to have pilfered from a German officer without being caught.

His obsession with the weapon had already earned him the nickname "Tueur" which translated rather coarsely and literally from the French as 'killer'.

The men around him were ultimately meant only to act as guides. Their destination was the Liege region in southern Belgium. Their mission had been, curiously, named Badger. Nikola knew of another group attempting the same fete, departing from Givet, France and heading for the Huy region. Huy and Liege were a mere 36 kilometers apart but the mission was vital. The information important to the freedom of the tiny country.

That, Nikola reasoned, was why they were paying him so much money to be their spy.


	4. Chapter 4

I would like to dedicate this chapter to my new passionate love of Google...without it...I would be nothing.

* * *

Chapter 4

_Somewhere outside of Nieuwdorp, Belgium_

_February 1943_

It was eight hours of travel from the sea side town to the Belgian border. The three trucks that they had been allotted were old, rickety and slow. The pitted country roads did nothing to help the shocks and given how slowly the caravan was moving, most of the men opted to walk instead of ride. All ten wore dark browns and grays, trying to blend into the country side as much as possible. Even the trucks were running without lights through that long night to avoid drawing attention from planes above.

It was cold and sometime after midnight it had begun to snow. The temperature rose as the flakes began to fall but only enough to make it more humid, and seem colder. The men didn't complain however, moving silently with the trucks, only stopping once each hour to rest, switch out drivers and drink water from the casks in the back of the lead truck.

Nikola had decided to ride for the first hour, in the passenger seat of the lead truck. The driver was just barely out of his teens and Tesla found the conversation distractingly dull, worse still when the driver fell silent in moody rumination after the Serbian essentially admitted that he had no allegiance to Belgium, or any of the afflicted Eastern countries .

The second hour he chose to walk, pulling his dark blue traveling coat tightly around his thin frame, and pulling the woolen seamen's cap down over his ears. He had recently removed the mustache and he could feel the strange sensation of his upper lip freezing without the protection of the hair once growing there. Perhaps it was that small discomfort that was annoying him, and not really the irritation with men who declared loyalties for one homeland, and no other.

The third hour he sat in the back of the rear truck, writing another letter with a pencil that Georg had provided. Georg De Vos was 25, the eldest of the men with the exception of Nikola, but looked twice his age. He had chosen to ride in the back of one of the trucks out of necessity instead of desire.

"I have a deformed leg." He had said simply and openly when Nikola bent forward to take the writing implement from him.

Nikola blinked at the comment as it had come completely unprovoked. He said nothing, and then found it wasn't necessary to do so because Georg intended to continue speaking regardless.

"I was twelve, living on the streets with my mother. I stole a watch from a rich gentleman and he had me thrown in jail. When I tried to escape, I broke my leg. There was no money to go to a doctor. It healed badly."

Tesla said nothing, starting his letter to Helen with the story of Georg and his life on the streets going in the background. It wasn't long before he had run out of lies to tell her about his supposed train trip and he decided to color the letter with a splash of truth.

Georg continued to speak and Tesla wrote it down.

_Georg says that he had been poor all his life but that he did not mind having no funds. He amused himself running from the law, chasing after a constant supply of stray animals in the streets and excelling at light handed thievery. He regrets that his first career ended as a result of the jail incident. _

_If I asked him to keep parts of his life secret, Helen, I am afraid the words and events would build up rapidly within his system and he would burst, scattering phrases and anecdotes round the car. _

_He continues, telling me that he was forced to learn to sing and play the cornet as a result of his injury. He was a clever boy and found a female teacher that would give him lessons in exchange for certain favors. He says that this arrangement ended when the teacher's husband returned from a long business trip to find his wife and young Georg engaged in playing a romantic piece for cornet and fife. _

_Georg misses the 'fife', but he still has his 'cornet' and counts himself lucky…_

The fourth, fifth and sixth hours were spent walking. It was the only way to escape Georg's story telling. He noticed quickly that none of the other men would walk with him. Whichever truck he kept pace with they would walk to the front or the back of him. If they were in front the younger ones would often walk backwards or turn in circles to take continuous glances at him.

He smirked, not sure how he felt about being the resident curiosity, and knowing that if he was forced to transform at any time on this mission there would be more than stares coming his way.

They were "Laiton et Chanteurs de l'Allemagne". Or that was the French translation of the name they were to go by. They were being sent as a touring group of performers by the German war department on a good will tour. The brain children in the resistance had decided that posing as friends of the enemy, while gaining hatred from the natives, would provide the greatest ease of movement and safety.

Most of the young men with Nikola had been chosen for the mission primarily for their abilities to play instruments and sing. They were not trained fighters; most of them were not even officially inducted into their nation's army.

Dane Smets was a self-taught and fairly accomplished violinist and had been designated the 'leader' of the troupe of performers, while Georg was to be the lead vocalist. Nikola was meant to be one of the singers was well, given that he had never learned an instrument and that their ability to pass as an entertainment troupe relied on their being able to actually entertain. The resistance leaders had emphasized several times that Nikola was to be the only one doing any spying. It was Tesla that declared, thus, that he should be the manager of the troupe. Avoiding the complications of singing songs he didn't know or being missed during a performance.

It would also allow him the freedom of taking pictures of the crowds and surrounding countryside without being questioned. After all, proof must be taken of the affect the goodwill tour was having on the people to show Das Fuehrer.

The walk across the Netherlands had given him ample time to think about the details. The moment the trucks had crossed onto Belgian soil they stopped again. The men were tired, grumbling softly at one another about wanting to start a fire and heat water for tea or coffee. Some of the younger boys that had been walking before quietly crawled into the back of the lead truck and fell asleep.

Georg emerged from his truck sore, lurching into the bushes to take care of some urgent business. The others stood waiting for him, expectantly. Nikola took notice and watched the group as they unconsciously started to form into a circle. When Georg returned he easily stepped into the spot saved for him in the circle, pushed aside the heavy sheepskin coat he wore and pulled out a sheep's bladder full of sloshing liquid. Dane lit a single, rolled cigarette and the tobacco passed around to each man, to take an appreciative puff.

They made no notice of Tesla, nor did anyone invite him to participate. Tired of standing, the vampire went to the truck where the boys were sleeping and perched on the truck's bed, enraptured by the ceremony happening before him.

As the cigarette was drained away and the sheep stomach of wine came into play Dane started to put his feet to the dirt road. One-two, one-two, he marched in place starting a slow plodding beat. The others joined in, moving their feet and swaying in the circle as the beat continued, building only slightly in momentum.

Then like a set of bagpipes Dane hummed a tone that accented with each beat. The others picked it up, still moving their feet, until Georg's voice rose above the tone.

The first phrase of Brabançonne, the Belgian national anthem, began and some of the voices in the circle joined Georg in song while the others continued to provide the beat and the harmony. They were careful to keep their voices hushed, and their heads facing the ground to muffle the sounds.

Even still Georg's voice was hard to ignore. He was a practiced and strong tenor and easily reached the higher notes in the song. The group reached the end of the first verse, modulated up and started the second verse, and Tesla felt a chill race down his spine.

The second and third verses continued, growing softer where the Serbian might have expected them to grow louder until there was barely any sound at all coming from the group. They had moved inward, closing the circle until each man could comfortably put his hands on the shoulders of the man next to him.

_It was like watching a handful of metal spheres suddenly attracted to a magnet, but moving so fast that the friction caused them to coalesce instead of ricochet, forming a new far greater sphere with flawless roundness, perfect in every way. The sound coming from the Belgians in their circle grew so quiet that the void of sound was like a blasting horn to the ears._

* * *

_Present Day – Old City_

"My taste in music has never been for folk songs, or blatantly patriotic pieces, but their presentation of the music was methodical, scientific and brilliant. Even their passion and love for country, emotions that I most often detest when they are applied to concepts and not entities, stilled my hand from this letter and completely arrested my attention.

We are moving again, now. The disturbance on the track ahead, I can only assume, has been resolved. Yours, Nikola Tesla."

Helen sat smiling softly as Will finished his recitation. She had been staring blindly at her cooling cup of tea from the moment Will began reading, remembering the first time she had read the letter. Remembering James' reaction to it, and her own. She had always wondered why something that so clearly affected Nikola in that moment had never come up in conversation since.

"Huh…" Was Will's comment as he flipped the hard plastic page back and forth, closely inspecting the faded pencil marks. "Again no return address."

"He never included them." Helen said.

"That doesn't immediately make you suspicious?" Will asked, turning to another letter. He skimmed over it for a moment before shaking his head and moving on. "I guess he spent a lot of time with this group of Belgians."

"That is strange. A group of Belgian performers on a train in Denmark."

"In the midst of the German invasion during WWII." Will finished, looking across the table at his boss and friend.

Magnus had a look on her face that said she was starting to put some things together and she stood, moving back to the table that had become the equivalent of a crime scene, still containing, untouched, all the books that Tesla had been looking at that morning.

She sorted through them, looking over the arrangement on the table before she closed every book, digging down to the bottom.

Will looked back to the letters, skipping over a series that were written entirely in pencil before he found an oddity. A picture post card from the Netherlands. He was about to turn the picture of mountains and fields over to read the back when he heard Helen's shocked voice across the room.

"My God, Will." She said, and Will could see her hand visibly shaking, hovering over the open page of a large book. "My God…"


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

_Belgium _

_March 1943_

They traveled together for a month, gaining some renown in each little berg where they performed. The mornings would be spent traveling, with occasional stops for rehearsals. The afternoons were spent securing housing for the night and locating a space in the town that would let them make use of a facility for a stage. In some cases they had only the streets for a platform and only the trucks for beds.

Some towns greeted them excitedly. The women coming out to hug and kiss the men with roses and food and casks of wine in hand, while the older men glowered at the troupe from the windows of shops and houses, calling to their daughters, and often, wives, to return immediately; there was work to be done.

Nikola did not at first notice that he was getting the same attention as the other men. It took a night of good natured ribbing for him to accept that he had a following of female admirers that rivaled Dane, and even Tueur, whose quiet shyness, due to his love for his Luger and only his Luger, translated as attractive vulnerability to feminine hearts.

But for his introductions of the performers at the beginning of each show and the many hours he spent writing missives to Helen and to the heads of the resistance, a process that was pleasurable (when writing to Helen) and alternately torturous (when writing tediously coded messages to the resistance), Nikola spent most of his time behind the view finder of a camera. And there was no shortage of subjects.

A spark of innovation in a shop keeper's window. A design of one of his own inventions that had been modified, if not improved. Buildings with radio towers on their roofs that seemed to exceed what was necessary for what the building housed. Pictures of men's faces, grim and unsmiling. Women too thin to be truly alive, with desperately painted cheeks that failed to make them attractive, plying themselves on the street.

When he could find the materials, Nikola converted one of the trucks into a dark room and developed the photographs himself, keeping those that he had taken for his own purposes and mailing the rest to the resistance. The negatives he kept hidden in various spots in the trucks.

No one questioned the group, or Tesla, as they passed from town to town.

It wasn't until they were mere miles out of Liege that they were greeted with a security patrol, the first sign of German occupation they had come across in the country.

The caravan of trucks and men on foot was easy to spot at a distance primarily thanks to some women in the last town they had visited who had been kind enough to create a banner out of cloth and paint. This the men had hanging from the lead truck, declaring who they were, and the names, "Dane und Georg!" in bold lettering. Nikola Tesla's alias was on the bottom in small letters as the manager.

The young, broad chested, blonde haired men helping to block the road made the usual shows of bravado and force.

At first the highest ranking among them approached with orders in butchered Flemish. Nikola, seated in the passenger seat of the first truck turned to the boy driving, a seventeen year old that went by Philippe.

"Sit tight, say nothing. This is the easiest of our challenges." Nikola said.

The boy nodded silently, his eyes wide. He looked terrified. The vampire opened his door, and hoped he wouldn't be run over by the truck if Philippe suddenly lost all muscle control and lifted his foot off the clutch. He stepped down to the ground and plastered a smile on his face, spreading his arms in a friendly gesture. In high German he greeted the soldier.

"Please! Friend. Why speak the language of your lesser, especially when you speak it so badly."

Surprised the German officer cast an uncertain glance towards the armed men standing behind him. They stood in front of the hastily erected guard tower and a pair of sawhorses acting as a gate, probably as a temporary defense while a more permanent structure was being created down the road.

"You are German?" Was the first question he was asked and Nikola grinned broadly.

"We are sent from the Fatherland, by the Fuhrer himself, to bring cheer and comfort to this new land. You may have heard of us. We've traveled with great success for many months now." One month, many, the expanse of time didn't really matter in the long run. The more established they were in the young guard's mind, the easier it would be to pass future check points, Tesla thought.

With a nod backward the officer galvanized his men into motion. With one waiting between the saw horses, the other two started to either side of the line of trucks, inspecting them closely.

"You have papers?"

"Of course, for every man." Even as he confirmed the question the men in each truck were pulling the documents from their bill folds and presenting them for the soldiers' perusal.

Nikola whipped his own papers out of his billfold with a flourish befitting someone accustomed to the theatre and with a snap, unfolded the crisp document causing the officer to jump slightly. He thinly veiled the smile of satisfaction while Short, Blonde and Ineffective leaned in for a closer look.

"These are in order…" The man said after a moment, and Tesla noticed the slight tremor that had entered his voice. He wasn't familiar enough with the higher ups in Berlin to know which high ranking officer's name had been forged on the documents. Clearly Blondie did.

"You are singers and instrumentalists?" The young man asked, waiting for his men to complete their inspections.

"The finest entertainers that the Fatherland could provide. Proving that we aren't just talented at making beer and sausages." Tesla started laughing loudly and was pleased when his hastily made joke was actually funny to Blondie as well. Apparently what Germany had been exporting in the midst of his Croatian childhood hadn't changed much in 80 some years.

He had learned in his Edison days that it was always best to leave the audience wanting more. Before he could be dismissed by the officer, Nikola spun on a heel and walked back to the truck. He didn't wait to be told that they were allowed to pass, even as the soldiers returned to the guard tower. He signaled the other drivers in the troupe to start their engines then climbed onto the foot board of the lead vehicle.

"Start it up, drive forward slowly and do not stop." He said through the small crack in the passenger side window, then held on as the mass of metal and wood shuddered then pulled forward.

The inventor could see the blonde officer's mouth working, his mind clicking away, trying to decide if he should stand before the trucks and stop their forward motion when he had already been planning on letting them pass, or let them go and play along.

The decision was made for him when the men under his command moved the sawhorses out of the way and stood to the side. As an afterthought, and to save face, Blondie snapped his heels together and threw his hand into the air in a salute as Tesla went by.

Nikola sneered, at the last moment tipping two fingers in acknowledgement, before the last truck pulled past the barricade and he opened the passenger door, smoothly stepping up into the truck and telling Philippe. "Speed it up."

They covered the distance to Liege in minutes. As he had expected there was a large stone building being renovated along the road outside of town. Nikola snapped a photo of it as they passed.

If the presence of the Fatherland had been minimal outside of Southern Belgium it was impossible to miss once they entered Liege. The garish flags, showing a flagrant abuse of a once benign symbol, hung from every major building in the city. Some streets were charming and decorated with signs of the previous holidays. Baubles and wreathes on the doors, bright ribbons at the tops of the flagpoles. Other streets were pitted with craters, crumbled walls spilling out into abandoned streets and waifs of humanity scattered amongst the wreckage, taking what shelter they could in what might have once been grand old homes.

It had been almost two years since Liege had fallen, but, much like the 20 year old flood marks on the buildings, the scars remained.

Philippe was silent beside Nikola, staring around him as he navigated the streets with a pale and horrified mask sweeping over his face.

"Stop here, Phillippe." Nikola urged.

At first the boy didn't hear him and Nikola reached out a hand, laying his gloved fingertips against Phillippe's shoulder. The boy jumped, the look of fear and hatred that he had been casting towards the wounded city turned immediately toward the vampire.

Inwardly Nikola cringed. It wasn't him, not entirely, that the boy feared, he told himself. "Pull to the side, Phillippe. We'll ask about the theatre."

The look faded from his eyes at the softly issued command and the boy finally eased, pulling the truck into a narrow alley and continuing down it until all three vehicles could fit. The alley curved down a steep decline and from there they had a framed view of the west end of the city, and the Meuse River cutting through it, busy with traffic.

Already some of the other men were climbing down from their trucks. Dane and Georg stood apart from the others; quietly standing with arms crossed waiting for Nikola to join them. The young boys remained in the truck beds, staring open mouthed, as Phillippe had been at the severe, black and white contrasts between destruction and impenetrability. Hans and Diegter, the only two of the ten that were related to one another, stood behind the last truck in heated discussion.

From the beginning the two, only one year apart, were at each other's throats. More than a few fights had been stopped when they went from tension releasing spats to knife-wielding attempts at fratricide. Nikola eyed the bickering pair as he sauntered down the brick and stone tunnel, ignoring the icy blast of the wind channeled through it.

"We might have to decrease the size of our troupe." Nikola said in English, waiting to see if Dane understood before he repeated the words in French.

The three men turned to watch the brothers, waiting for the argument to end and the two to separate, before they ignored them.

"They aren't the only ones that are angry, Mr. Tesla." Georg said, his usual matter of fact calm a little edgier.

"I had family in this town." Dane told him. "We visited when I was a child. It was a magical place for me and now…"

"This city has suffered two years…too long." Georg agreed.

"And unfortunately…" Tesla began then stopped himself, dialing down the arrogance in his tone before he amended, "Regrettably, we weren't sent here for liberation. Not yet."

Georg and Dane shared a look before they nodded. They had known that, and they were smart enough to know that five men and five boys could hardly defeat an army of super soldiers. With Hans and Diegter always in combat, the remaining adults were forced to be responsible and level headed. Once Tesla felt they were all truly in agreement he sighed and snapped his gaze toward the street they had just left.

"I think for now we could all use something to do. And splitting Cain and Abel would be wise as well. I'll take Philippe, Diegter and the two youngest, and ask after the theatre purported to be in town. The two of you can be responsible for lodging, preferably not above a ready supply of liquor and remember, do not speak unless spoken to, and in that case, German…if at all possible."

By the time Nikola struck out on foot followed by two twelve year olds, the hot head and his faithful driver, the trucks had begun pulling out of the alley heading away from the town proper. It was best that way, Nikola thought, with satisfaction. The fewer familiar faces, the easier it would be to slip in and out of places they were not supposed go.

On the sidewalk he scanned the street, absently straightening the cuffs of his shirt. He catalogued each person as they passed him by based on shape, size and demeanor before continuing up to the next block. Three blocks later he found what he was looking for and ordered the boys to start their routine.

Immediately they started whooping and hollering. One picked up a stick and the other grabbed a stray broom from the hands of a shop keeper. Each used his object in a fierce sword battle, carrying the noise and display into the street and toward a capped well, seated in the middle of an intersection, that had been turned into a fountain. With grace and energy that only the young possess the boys executed perfect flips and jumps and dives as they performed their well-rehearsed fight. On cue Diegter and Phillippe stepped into the street as the fight grew in its ferocity and started a slightly improvised banter with the boys.

"What are you young ones fighting over?"

"He said something about my mother. It was crude and unkind."

"And what was it he said?"

The joke changed in each city, getting more and more clever. Those that over heard it chuckled and like clockwork a crowd began to gather. Nikola watched, for the moment all but invisible in the crush of bodies, observing as some of their impromptu audience began to realize that they were not seeing reality, but in fact creativity at work.

The jokes continued, and their speech pattern halted from time to time to allow for laughter. As the last joke rang out, each of the actors now standing on the rim of the fountain so that they could better be seen and heard, Nikola stepped up onto the rim as well.

The four actors bowed upon seeing their troupe manager and the audience erupted into applause. When it died Nikola projected his voice out over their heads.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, children and babes. To anyone that can hear my voice, see my face, or smell my stench…" There he paused as the audience laughed and the actors near him exaggerated movements of disgust. "I issue an open invitation. We, the Singers and Brass of Germany, have come to offer you the finest entertainment in your own language, in the comfort of your lovely town. We ask for no fee for attendees!"

The name of the country now invading and oppressing them had killed much of the momentum in the crowd but Nikola won some of them back with the proffer of a free show. After the smattering of applause had died Nikola finished his spiel.

"We need only three things. Food!" He shouted, and the actors mimed stuffing their mouths.

"A bed…" He cooed. Diegter and Phillippe put out their arms and the two boys fell into them, miming exhaustion.

"And a stage on which to ply our craft."

From the crowd came a strong male voice, the words in German, the accent indicating wealth and higher education. The crowd parted away from the sound like prey from a predator.

"How delightful…" The voice said over the sound of jack boots hitting cobblestone.

Nikola cocked his head to the side, his broad smile not faltering despite the second or third bone creaking chill he had received on this mission.

"What a talented troupe, and what a divine gift from Der Fuhrer to his loyal subjects."

The German officer was tall and pale. His mouth very wide and his facial muscles taught enough such that his cheek bones could cut if he came to grips with a window. Wiry blonde hair was cropped close to his skull under his cap and even under the thick wool overcoat and uniform Nikola had no doubt this man was a capable officer.

"I am Colonel Franz Korbher. It would be my delight to introduce you to our theater."


	6. Chapter 6

Warning: Long chapter ahead.

* * *

Chapter 6

_Liege, Belgium_

_March 1943_

Their first week in the theater was a whirlwind.

The building itself was massive, intended to house operas and Shakespeare. The stage and the wings were large enough to store the trucks, the actors and half a dozen tanks (and there were about that many tanks in the streets), to say nothing about what they could fit in the auditorium.

Nikola wrote Helen a five page letter expounding on the theatre alone that he did not intend to send.

The expected denizens of the theatre, stage managers, pages, actors and actresses, a large ballet company, full orchestra, an organist and even a gentleman with an array of bagpipes were in and out of the building on a daily basis. Rehearsals that dwarfed what his company had managed on grassy roadsides, snipe nosed sopranos, tittering ballerinas, long faced scene movers and bespectacled costumers paid unexpected visits to the three storage rooms that Colonel Kohrber insisted be given to his 'brothers in arms'. Each new face popped in with an exaggerated gasp of surprise, then back out again with a barely believable excuse.

Despite the approval of the common folk that they had received on the street it was clear that the artistic community wanted nothing to do with Nikola Tesla and his bedraggled troupe. Being supposedly German helped nothing.

None the less after their first week of morning and matinee performances concluded the newspapers, which were predominantly pro-German, found nothing to say about them but praise. They had in fact managed to pack the house in their final three days and while the theatre managers clamored to find out why it was they weren't making money on full houses, the city insisted that some sort of method be enacted that would keep track of the number of bodies in the theatre.

The compromise was a small fee, far less than the regular ticket prices for evening performances, and a third evening performance to be held in the middle of the week, replacing an evening of dramas that no one was attending anyway.

At Kohrber's insistence the city provided room and board for the actors as well as a small, almost inconsequential salary to be given to Tesla and divvied amongst his troupe.

Returning to the boarding house where his men were now settled Tesla had fought two battles. The first was a show, a drama put on for the sake of the public officials, declaring the insult of so small a fee for such fine entertainers, demanding more and leaving in a huff. The second battle would be to convince his men that they needed the funds badly, and despite the taint of blood on the bills, they would have to accept them for now.

Lost in the words he intended to use, with the faces of Diegter, Hans, Philippe and the others playing before his eyes, Nikola didn't notice the Colonel standing in the foyer until the man had spoken. The transition from the silent streets to the silent building had so transfixed him that the presence of another person, especially a person that he had no love for whatsoever, shocked him into a string of Serbian curses.

Kohrber's eyebrows disappeared under the shadow of his hat as he said. "Serbian. And so well applied. You have many unseen talents Herr Wietzer."

"Ah, Colonel Korhber. What brings you to our humble abode." Nikola asked, slipping as quickly into Heinrich Wietzer as possible. The recovery was smooth, he admitted to himself but his slip up could have been costly.

"I have found you to be an intriguing personality from the moment you appeared on our streets. I have been looking forward to an opportunity where I might share a meal with you. Perhaps a late night supper, or lunch tomorrow." Kohrber's speech, while carefully constructed, had a noticeable hitch to it the longer he spoke. Nikola decided that the Colonel had to have been afflicted by a speech impediment as a child. Something that he had taken great pains to overcome.

Putting one foot on the stairs that would take him up three flights to the company, Nikola considered the offer for a moment, before he waved the envelope of bills in his hands and said, apologetically, "I believe I have something the men will want."

He turned to head up the stairs but was stopped before he had cleared three steps.

"I can wait…" Kohrber said, a pale hand coming to rest on the banister, his tone subtly suggesting that dinner that evening was no longer an invitation.

Nikola's rage boiled quickly. He was not a man to take orders, nor to be intimidated and as he wasn't actually a 'man' at all, but heir to the greatest race in history, not to mention brilliant inventor and scientist, the presumption of authority coming from the man below him slid under his proverbial skin like a thorn.

He immediately wanted to toy with the man, turn him into a stool pigeon and a crony and when he was finished, send him whimpering back to Der Fuhrer and Das Fatherland with his tail tucked between his legs. With a wry quirk of the lips Nikola pocketed the envelope and returned to the main floor landing.

"On second thought…" He said, then ducked his head slightly and gestured with his arm for Kohrber to lead the way.

Kohrber seemed pleased and jerked his head impulsively before striding out of the building, practically goose stepping as he went.

"Of course, my interest has been purely scientific." Kohrber began once they were on the street.

By most standards the night was still young. It was only the schedule of his theatre group that had Nikola already thinking about the pretense of bed. His evening hours were spent, for the most part, catching up on paper work that had to be neglected during the day. There was also the stack of undeveloped film rolls waiting for him.

"I never went to the theatre as a child, even to see the movies." Kohrber told him, his lips curling in a curiously patronizing and intimate smile before his face went completely slack.

Tesla was unnerved, ever so slightly, but chose to ignore the odd mannerisms.

"You travel with a group of men that are clearly passionate about their craft, speak with heavy Belgian accents and never leave the theatre or their new home but for to travel between the two."

Nikola opened his mouth slightly in surprise, realizing that Kohrber had just pointed out a major flaw in their cover and that the inner strife they had been working hard to avoid ultimately brought more suspicion on them. He turned his reaction into a knowing smile that a worldly man would give to another worldly man. He played along as if they both knew what the other was thinking. His greatest fear was that Kohrber did know his thoughts.

"Many of these men were raised on the street, preforming to put bread in the mouths of their families each day. Most of their stipend is sent home, to their wives and children."

"Ah." Kohrber nodded, accepting the lie. "And you Mr. Wietzel. What wife and children do you send your stipend to?"

"My sister and her children are more than deserving of what little aid I can give them."

"Not married. A man as young and strapping as yourself…some woman would be happy to have you." The colonel's tone had a twist to it that Tesla did not like. What might have been a perfectly normal conversation between two gentlemen on the street was rapidly descending into something on a totally different vein.

The Serbian was glad for the reprieve caused by their entrance into a relatively crowded café. The concierge met them eagerly, recognizing them both but seeming far more comfortable in conversation with Tesla than he was the German officer. They were lead to the back and up a flight of stairs to the balcony level that ringed the walls of the building. The evening was warm enough that Nikola found it reasonable to eat on the outer balcony. It took little convincing on Kohrber's part and they were soon seated, a glass of wine ordered and their specials recited by the jittery head waiter.

While they waited Kohrber pulled a cigarette case from his lapel, offered a slender crafted smoke to Nikola, who declined, then lit one for himself. Smugly, Tesla admitted surprise to himself that there was no cigarette holder in play.

"I have spoken with General Goehring in Berlin. He and I have shared many a meal at the Fuhrer's table. For such a skinny man he can eat a lot." Kohrber's voice broke a little as he chuckled at himself, smoke puffing from his mouth with each outburst.

Nikola narrowed his eyes. He could smell the lie coming and he tilted his head. "I thought Goehring was rather portly. The photographs I've seen of him seem heavier than others."

Kohrber's smile was humorless. "Yes, of course. I am thinking of his younger days." The conversation paused when the wine was brought to them. With no sign of indecision the head waiter presented the bottle to Nikola instead of the Colonel and after it had been tested and approved Nikola insisted on being the one to pour, dismissing the waiter quickly but politely.

"Prost." The colonel toasted, raising his glass before he tapped its base on the table.

Nikola did the same, muttering the toast quietly before bringing the rim of the cup towards his lips. He didn't drink until after he murmured, "What has Goehring to say of Liege?"

"Nothing." Kohrber's voice was cold. "He says nothing of Liege, nor of a good will tour sent on his behalf. In fact he was surprised and found the idea to be charming, but not his own."

Tesla didn't know who Goehring was, but he had gathered in the past few minutes that he was well known and very high up in Berlin. He had also gathered that Goehring was likely to have his hands deeply buried in the entertainment pot and that the Belgian Resistance had done a horrid job of preparing their back story if they had forged the name of a top general in the army that could be so easily reached.

He couldn't remember the name signed on the documents in his billfold, he had been so quick to glance at the papers then store them away and he hadn't looked at them since. He reached into his pocket, his mind formulating his plan one way or the other, knowing it would all depend on the signature at the bottom of their orders.

What he saw would have turned him several shades of blue. He was instantly afraid, and seconds later, angry. He decided to use it. Throwing the piece of paper at the table he burst from his chair and marched away, his hands going to his hips. "The fools…" He declared, just loud enough for Kohrber to hear. "Of course we haven't received our due, of course we've heard nothing from Berlin." He shook his head before he turned. Kohrber had taken the bait and was looking over the paper.

"A forgery?"

"Clearly!" Nikola said, jabbing the tips of his fingers toward the table. "Someone's idea of a cruel joke. Some fool's errand to tear me from the Fatherland, send me gallivanting all over this disgusting country."

"A good forgery…" Kohrber said before he placed the paper back on the table. "How unfortunate for you."

"Me…? No sir. No. This is not _about_.._me_… This is about four men and five boys that are miles from their homes, serving The Reich the only way they can and expecting to be paid for it when they return. They won't stay with the tour once I've told them their money won't come. The only thing keeping them in that…boarding house, is going to be this…" Nikola pulled the envelope of bills out of his pocket and slapped them dramatically onto the table. At the corner of the balcony an older couple jumped at the sound.

Like a rapidly blooming rose, Nikola had a plan. The concierge, likely called by the head waiter, was hurrying to their table, stuttering about the wine and their meals and wondering what had caused such an outburst. Nikola ignored the man, pacing away.

He had long ago given up seeing the money that the resistance forces had promised him, and would admit to finding some satisfaction, if small, in the day to day workings of their troupe. He had always been attracted by the theatre and working the medium, as well as his nightly forays into the town with his camera, had managed to free his mind from the things that normally troubled him. In a way it was a vacation. The first he had ever taken.

To actually manage to collect on the money that had drawn him there in the first place was the icing on the cake. Kohrber had a great deal of pull with the community and was doubtless the officer in charge of the occupying forces in Liege. Given enough time and effort Nikola would be able to get the money and all the information the resistance could use before disappearing again and returning to the work he truly loved. Maybe he really would travel to Serbia.

Having formulated his next plan of attack Nikola turned to address Kohrber only to find that he was no longer at the table, nor for that matter, on the balcony. The concierge was also curiously absent along with the paper Tesla had thrown.

The envelope of bills remained, however, and he picked it up tucking it back into his jacket before the tall vampire crossed the length of the balcony, advancing rapidly on the older couple at the end. At the last moment he surpassed them to look over the edge. The colonel was below, walking quickly with the concierge up the street. The gray haired man was gesticulating desperately at the blonde, but his motions seemed more an encouragement of the current course than a deterrent.

Something was wrong. Nikola had every reason to fear that it might have to do with his men. He was prepared to launch himself from the balcony in the interest of saving time but the haughty voice of the older woman stopped him. She was displeased with his dramatic scene from earlier and sensing that she was just the sort to immediately spread the news of a man launching himself from a story above street level Nikola chose against it. He took off running back the way he had come, moving around the corner of the building before he launched himself into the alley. A quick transformation allowed him to land safely in the darkness below and he took off running.

The streets of the entertainment district were fairly well lit, especially near the businesses still active at that hour. Beyond those areas however the city was dark, either because of the destruction from the invasion or an interest in conserving gas or electricity. It didn't matter much as the vampire DNA he bore allowed him to widen his irises far beyond the capability of a human.

It had been so long since he had transformed and the feeling so exhilarating that Nikola remained in his true form as he moved through the darkened streets. He could hear the voices of the city, heart beats mixing together, the sounds and smells growing and fading as he passed each building. It didn't take him long to catch up with the German officer. From a block away and partially obscured by the southern wall of an apothecary Nikola watched as Kohrber and the concierge stopped on the sidewalk, their former argument reduced now to a whisper.

There was a brief exchange that ended with the colonel pointing the fidgety older man westward before shoving him in the same direction. After a few stumbling steps the man righted himself and shuffled purposefully down the street.

Kohrber looked up to the shop he stood before, his eyes focused far beyond the picture window and up toward the second story. Nikola followed his gaze, confused, as the second story was as dark as the first. There was a thin line of smoke coming from one of the chimneys, but for that the building was still and silent.

Nikola glanced down the narrow space between buildings before hurrying across the gap. There was a small sconce jutting out from the second story window above him, just wide enough for a planter and not meant to act as a balcony. The vampire judged it to be sturdy enough to hold him and, after taking a preparatory breath, he launched himself upward, latching taloned hands onto the wrought iron railing. He pulled himself up and over, exchanging his grip on the iron for one on the window's frame. The shades had been drawn and there was no light behind them. He could hear two slow heart beats with in, the measured breathing of sleeping individuals.

There was something else though, a more rapid heartbeat that was joined by two, four others the more he listened. But the pulses were not coming from the second story. He looked up, judged that the roof peaked high enough to allow room for a cramped but substantial third floor, and crouched on the sconce, measuring the distance between his current position and the tiny opening at the crown of the eaves.

He jumped, missed the opening and clawed desperately at the stone walls, cramming his fingers into an excavation of soft clay and stifling a groan as all his weight suddenly hung from the knuckles of one hand. He was higher than before, and two stories above the ground. He hadn't done much falling in the past few years, hadn't really explored just what it would take to defeat the vampire genome and actually die. He didn't imagine it would feel good to plummet to the pavement. The gap he had wedged his claws into was starting to widen even as he hung there, failing construction causing the plaster to crumble.

He was going to fall, was being pelted by the very wall that was giving out on him and worse still there was the sound of more than a dozen pair of boots on the other side of the building and Kohrber's voice ringing out issuing orders. He had too make the decision to fall or climb. The sound of a gasping cry, filtering through the small hole he had made into the attic, drew his attention before he could. Then all hell broke loose.

The front door was kicked open and the shop on the main floor infiltrated. Below him on the street he heard more footsteps at a dead run, likely covering the possibility of a back door escape. Who was escaping, or why, he didn't know. Clinging to the side of the building like an overgrown bat wasn't going to help him at all. He prayed silently to his ancestors, and the God of his father for good measure, then pulled his hand free of the hole, widening it even more before he plunged to the street.

He bent his knees as he landed directly in front of the two soldiers ordered to the rear, turned to face them then hissed; baring his teeth and claws in one horrifying moment. The first soldier ran, the second tried to bring his gun to bear. Two quick slashes of his claws and the soldier was on the ground, moaning.

Get out, his mind told him. Get out before Kohrber is called back here to deal with the vampire no one thought existed. Lights were snapping on behind the curtains on the second level, another light swept across the hole Nikola had created. He was fading back further into the shadows when a hand shot through the gap in the wall, pushing at the plaster and stone to widen it.

"What in heaven's…"

The hand disappeared then reappeared, punching desperately at mortar and rock, the debris launching out into the street as the hole was widened. The plaster had to have been recently applied, the rock very young and that part of the building rebuilt for the walls to be so weak.

Nikola stepped toward the house again as a scream rang out. It had come from the second story but he had a sinking feeling that the sleeping couple wasn't the goal. Whoever was trying to bust through the wall was. The hole had expanded to about the width of his shoulders when a pale and frightened female face appeared.

"Quickly, quickly," She wheezed, speaking to someone behind her before she started to feed a length of sheets, tied end to end, from the hole.

There was a second scream from behind the shuttered window, a man's voice shouting violently in protest and then the sound of a pair of shots. The male voice was silenced, the female voice began to wail. Kohrber could be heard over it all, shouting orders.

On the third floor a child joined the woman, a pre-teen boy who was quick to grasp at the sheet and start shimmying down. Nikola could see from below that their makeshift rope wasn't nearly long enough and as the boy drew closer Nikola whispered loudly for him to jump.

The boy jerked in fright, his hands let loose of the sheet and he fell ten feet into Nikola's waiting arms. Terrified the boy beat at his head and shoulders until Tesla released him, then took off running down the alley. It was just as well Nikola thought as screams erupted from the floor the boy had just left.

There was a rapid burst of shots from a machine rifle and a second child appeared at the gap. A young girl, no more than six. She was bleary eyed, her hair tousled, obviously aroused from deep sleep.

"Throw her…" Nikola shouted, first in German, than in French when his words had no effect. The sound of her mother language attracted the young woman's attention and time slowed to a crawl.

Gun shots, screams, shouts of soldiers and running feet.

"There's not time! Throw her now." Nikola screamed upward, abandoning stealth for expedience.

With her face contorted in horror, desperation and the realization that her life would soon be ending the young woman in the wall did exactly that. She grasped the child under her arms, fed her feet first through the hole and released her.

The child made no sound, perhaps too frightened even to screech. Her white night dress flapped and fluttered as she drifted to the earth, a tattered stuffed animal clutched tightly in her skinny arms. Her face was turned upward, searching even as she plummeted for the young woman who was likely to have been her mother.

More shots, and Nikola knew the woman was dead. He caught the child, doing everything in his power to shield the impact of her fall just as soldiers rounded the back corner of the house. Thankfully Kohrber was not with them.

They opened fire, bullets flew as Nikola turned his back towards them, shielding the child and taking off at a dead run. The first impact was high on his back and hurt like blue blazes. The next two he felt as punches to his kidneys, but oddly devoid of pain. The bullet that hit his knee knocked his leg out from under him. With a growl he struggled upward, limped hard forward and finally rounded the block where the bullets could no longer find him.

His lungs burned, filling with fluid but he continued to run. He was spitting blood out with each exhale, staining the child's night dress, but he dare not stop. Only when the sounds had faded from his considerable hearing and his steps had slowed to a crawl did he pause.

He propped himself against the crumbling wall of an abandoned factory and tried to unlock the arms that had a chokehold on his neck. "Sweet heart…" He gasped, desperately working to disguise the pain leeching into his voice. "I want to see that you're alright." He just barely remembered to say the words in French.

It took some coaxing but the girl finally loosened her hold, leaning back away from him but refusing to be put down. He looked her over, wincing at the blood staining one of her shoulders, but grateful that it was his and not hers.

There were tears in his eyes, brought on by the pain, and tears in her eyes that made the intoxicating brown hue no more beautiful than russet, no more rich than chocolate. With a shaking hand, now returned to its human form, Nikola brushed unruly reddish blonde hair back and was instantly, impossibly and heart-breakingly in love.

The child was physically untouched, and she returned quickly to squeezing the life out of his neck, the pressure of her stuffed animal squished up against his heart. He whispered assurances as he forced himself to his feet.

The wounds would heal, the hole in his knee already doing so, but he needed a place to do it in, a warm place where he could wrap the child in blankets and hopefully ply her with hot milk.

He was certain Kohrber had not seen him, was convinced that the best place to hole up was exactly where Mr. Wietzel was supposed to be at that hour and started the slow return trip to the boarding house, the crack of gunshots and echo of shouts finally fading behind him.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

_Present Day – Old City_

"Wow that's…that's uncanny."

"It's not uncanny, Will. That _is _Tesla."

Will's brow furrowed, his face shouting his disbelief. He looked up expecting to have to convince Magnus of her mistake but she wasn't looking at him. She was staring down at the photograph on a glossy page of a book that focused on the Holocaust. The photo showed a crowd of people, closely gathered around a group of two men and one boy. To the right was a gentleman staring down at a sheet of paper held in the hands of the boy. The paper was likely sheet music, and Will could just make out the corner of a hand organ in the man's hand.

But their faces had blurred with the age of the photograph and the shaky hand of the photographer. The boy and man had been touched up, their faces redefined by the stroke of a pen so as to keep their features clear.

No additional definition had been necessary for the subject of the photograph. Standing in the center of the crowd with his mouth open in song, his arms crossed in discomfort and his eyes narrowed to the left of the camera was a tall, thin man. His dark hair had been slicked back, he wore a coat in keeping with the other figures in the photograph, and his face was smoother than Will remembered…but as he looked closer and longer he couldn't deny. He was staring at the face of Nikola Tesla.

"This photograph was taken of Jewish singer Heinrich Wietzel during an impromptu performance on the streets of German occupied Liege." Will read the caption. The photograph was dated March 22, 1943. The photographer was Elise Bronstien-Dumont, said to be five-years- old when the photograph was snapped by her hand.

"Bronstien-Dumont…" Helen muttered quietly, and then winced. "The name is familiar." A quick search of the internet would tell her for certain but she was loathe to leave the library, to leave the very spot in which she stood.

She was quiet for a long time, staring into the distance, before Will asked, "Magnus?"

She met his gaze but said nothing, gnawing on her bottom lip.

"You look like you've seen a ghost …and that doesn't normally happen around here."

"You've read the letters, Will. Look at the date. At this time in history Nikola was supposed to have been in or near Serbia. Perhaps it was fanciful of me to assume that he would actually follow through on his original plan, and given how quickly Nazi power spread I never really believed that he was in Asia at all before he chose to join the Allies. But the last place he should ever have been was in Liege, Belgium. Much less posing as a Jewish entertainer."

Her voice began to tighten as she finished and she pushed away from the book and the haunting photograph. Tesla's behavior, his obsession with that period in history, and his abrupt departure from the Sanctuary was pointing towards Liege, towards the Dumont woman in the book. Helen had to know who she was and for once she realized that the answers she wanted would not come from her expansive collection of literature.

Without a word to Will she stormed out of the library, headed for her office, a twisting sensation in her gut. There were always going to be things that Nikola hadn't told her, but this time around she was very afraid of the consequences that would come from discovering the truth.

* * *

_Liege, Belgium_

_March, 1943_

"Take her. Take her!" Nikola begged, barely able to breathe. The startled men in the room had already begun to move and Dane stepped forward wrapping an arm between the girl and Nikola. Tesla bruised her arm prying the appendage away from his neck but it was necessary. The moment she was free Dane backed away with her in his arms, watching as Georg slid under Nikola's left side, supporting the collapsing man the rest of the way across the room, and apologizing when Tesla's weight increased dramatically and both men crashed against the cot Nikola had been allotted.

Since he never slept, the vampire had decided it was unnecessary to have an actual bed.

His heart beat was slowing. He could feel it. He was tired. Every hole drilled into his hide was throbbing mercilessly now and he was still bleeding from the bullets that had pierced his kidneys.

"She needs a blanket…" Nikola gasped. He was lying on his side, his hips and torso on the cot, his shoulders propped against the wall, his legs hanging off the edge. He tried to gesture behind him toward the little one but Georg captured his flailing arm, wrestling it free of his coat sleeve.

"She's fine, Mr. Tesla, and you are not." Georg said, glancing up to Philippe who had lurched to his feet on Nikola's arrival, but stood staring down at a smear of blood on the floor, frozen.

"Philippe, the medical supplies." Georg said, keeping his voice calm.

"The blood…" The boy said and Georg groaned, starting to turn to Hans for help instead. Before he could say a word, Philippe spoke again.

"They'll follow the blood. They'll know he's here."

Propping the gasping Serbian up a bit more Georg worked the heavy coat away from the other arm before he looked to where the boy was pointing. There _was_ a trail of blood, and Philippe was right. It would draw whoever had shot their 'manager' directly to their door.

"Quickly, you and the other boys, into the cleaning closet with you-"

"Bleach and cold water." Nikola groaned, interrupting him. "Not hot."

Philippe's nod of understanding was slow but he moved a moment later, leaving the room to wake the younger boys sleeping down the hall, giving out instructions.

"Need to cover the side walk…and…the alley." Nikola muttered, moving as he was directed by Georg, not protesting when the vest was removed. Three growing patches of blood had morphed into a single stain on the once white shirt that he wore underneath; one high on his chest, the others near his waist.

"Bullets have gone through." Georg said.

"I'll heal, I'll be fine…" Nikola insisted, his eyes rolling back into his head, barely able to sit up.

"That part of being a vampire?" The scientist heard Dane's voice from a distance, at least a mile away despite his confidence that the man was still in the same room with him.

He couldn't breathe. His lungs burned, his diaphragm compromised. "Blood…" He said with one gasp of desperately needed air, "…helps."

Georg and Dane shared a look.

A pained smile came to Nikola's blood stained lips. His hand, lying limp on the blankets covering the cot moved, one finger extending, pointing vaguely at the corner of the room.

"My…vali…ce…" He managed before he was overwhelmed with a coughing fit that dredged up blood and a groan.

"Hans?" Dane asked, nodding toward the corner, his hands full with the child Nikola had stumbled in with.

Once he had received the bag Georg opened it, dug through the compulsively neat compartments of filed papers and film canisters until he found a small leather parcel that clearly didn't belong. It opened on a hinge and the contents helped him to understand.

A vial of a light pink solution was inside, large enough to occupy most of the case. Beside it, a single syringe.

Nikola tried to straighten his back, to sit up, and move. He couldn't breathe, could barely think, he knew he wouldn't be able to inject himself. When he failed to take the parcel from Georg the man met his eyes.

It only took a moment for him to acknowledge the silent request.

"How much?" He asked.

"T-twenty." Nikola responded, closing his eyes and wincing against yet another wave of pain.

He didn't feel the pinch of the needle, nor did he realize that he had passed out the moment it pierced his skin.

Georg withdrew the needle as soon as the plunger had been depressed and stared at the still body. He would have sworn that the mysterious life-saving liquid had come too late; that the man who was to lead their mission was now well and truly dead.

Dane kept the girl facing away from Nikola. She had gone limp in his arms, and her steady breathing indicated that she was sleeping, but he would take no chances. She need not see her savior lying dead in his own blood.

The silence continued, the men in the room meeting each other's gaze, all silently asking the same question. What now?

Then there was a gasp, the cot creaked and rocked against the wall and a vampire was once more among them. Nikola had grown long black claws where his fingernails had been, his teeth extending to sharp points and his eyes became black orbs, the white barely showing at the edges. His voice had deepened making his gasping breaths more pronounced.

Georg backed hurriedly away and Dane retreated all the way to the far wall, shielding the back of the young girl's head. The others in the room kept their distance, waiting in tense silence as Nikola familiarized himself with his surroundings.

It took him a moment more to realize that the looks of terrorized wonder he was getting were the result of his transformation. He solved the issue as quickly as he could, reverting to his human form and groaning as the fading pain revisited him, still a little out of breath.

Leaning forward on the cot, waiting for the nausea to pass, Nikola focused his now blue eyes on Georg first, then Dane and the other men.

"Thank you…" he said, drawing himself up. He would be sore, the wounds would need more time to fully disappear, and there was something building at the back of his soul that he would only be able to ignore for so long, but he was back.

Georg nodded to his thanks, looking relieved and Dane looked down to the sleeping angel on his shoulder making sure that his retreat hadn't disturbed her, but the silence was broken first by Tueur.

"Wow!" Was his astounded comment.

Despite himself Nikola laughed. Georg and Dane joined him, and for a moment every man in the room allowed himself to rejoice a little. After all, one among them had just cheated death.

"Philippe, and the boys, they're cleaning the sidewalk?" Nikola asked anxiously after the tension had finally ebbed.

Georg looked to the blood stains on his hands for a moment before he nodded.

Closing his eyes Nikola tried pushing to his feet. His head swam and the room spun but he was able to put one hand against the wall to stop himself from falling and felt Georg supporting him on the other side. When the spell passed Tesla turned to the cot, gauging how much of the covers had been ruined by his blood before he turned them down and waved Dane over. Quietly the three men put the young girl to bed, Nikola making certain that her animal, which turned out to be an oddly shaped dog, was tucked securely against her before tucking the blankets around her.

When he straightened his balance waivered again and both Dane and Georg lunged at him.

"We should talk…" Nikola said, recovering.

"You should rest." Dane countered.

"We'll do both, while we wait for the boys to return." Georg finished and the three exited the room.

"I thought you had gone to speak to the arts counsel?" Dane asked, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall in the hallway once the room door had closed. Georg stood on the other side, framing Nikola in a way that was becoming increasingly mother-hennish. If for no other reason than to escape their attentions, Tesla desperately wished for a faster recovery.

"I had. I was on my way back with good, or bad, news, depending on your view. Colonel Hans Kohrber was lurking in the foyer."

"Kohrber?"

Nikola nodded to Dane, who shuddered theatrically.

"He wanted to discuss some things and wouldn't take no for answer. We walked down to La Passerelle, sat down for dinner then he disappeared."

"Disappeared?"

"The concierge called him away for something. I followed him and-" Nikola stopped, lost suddenly in the panicky, adrenaline rushed moments on the street. The face of the young mother through the hole in the wall. The little girl falling through the air, a mother's desperate fear of what had come through the door outweighing her fear of the child plummeting to her death. And the little boy. He had run off and Nikola had forgotten about him.

He would need finding, before the soldiers killed him.

A cleared throat reminded him that he had an audience. Nikola flicked his eyes up distracted before he stared at the floor again. "What is happening in this country?" He demanded, crossing his arms and finally redirecting his gaze to Dane and Georg. "A mother, and countless others were murdered tonight. They weren't soldiers. They weren't spies. She was afraid for her children, she was…terrified."

He waited as the two Belgians faced each other. They had heard the rumors, but refused to believe them until that moment.

"We've heard that there is a plan…" Dane began slowly, "…to remove every person opposing the Third Reich. At first it was…political prisoners, gypsies, mental patients. They were taken away on trains. They said they were putting them in a place safe from the war. Putting them where they wouldn't be accidentally killed…because they couldn't defend themselves-" Dane was interrupted by Georg's angry voice.

"It's a lie. We've always, known it." He bit out, harshly. "They are after us now. Dane and I, and some of the boys."

At Nikola's look of confusion, Georg carefully said, "The Jews, Mr. Tesla. They intend to box us up in ghettos, close us up on trains and boats. Set us adrift, or put us in mass graves. They intend to wipe us from the planet once and for all."

"Genocide?" Nikola asked.

"A race…an entire race will be wiped out by this war…" Georg said.

"These are rumors-" Dane tried but was interrupted again.

"No! Not rumors. Fact. Tesla has seen it. It _is _happening, Dane!"

"And has happened. And will happen." Tesla said pushing away from the wall and heading for the stairs he had been struggling up only minutes before. "Unless we do something to stop it."


	8. Chapter 8

Thank you to my wonderful reviewer. Something is always better than nothing.

* * *

Chapter 8

_Liege, Belgium_

_March, 1943_

They spent the rest of the night searching for the young boy. Nikola refused even to bathe before venturing back out into the streets and by morning he was lagging behind. Georg and Dane had stayed with him most of the night, refusing to turn back and sleep as long as Tesla insisted on finding the child. Before he entered the hotel he asked that they precede him. He still wasn't entirely sure that Kohrber hadn't seen him and didn't care to run into the man in a blood soaked shirt and vest.

Once the coast was clear the three men ducked inside and headed up the stairs. Nikola made use of the small bathroom at the end of the hall and by mid-morning he was clean, shaved and relatively whole. The wounds were nothing more than pink blotches marring his skin, and but for a residual ache in his lungs, the Serbian felt no more pain.

The brothers, getting along for the first time since the mission began, were sent out to retrieve breakfast from a delicatessen on their street. Georg and Dane worked together to take dictation of the events of the long night while Nikola sat at the foot of the cot, one hand resting against the back of the sleeping five-year-old.

"My God…I completely forgot." Nikola interrupted himself, leaning forward on the cot, searching the floor then the chairs and beds around him. "My coat…"

"It's a blood stained wreck, Mr. Tesla." Dane said, still shocked at how vain the man seemed to be about his clothing.

"No…" Nikola grunted, frustrated before he found the dark blue heap of cloth kicked underneath the cot. He dragged it out and felt through the pockets pulling the envelope of bills free.

"We've been paid…sorta." He said before he froze staring at the package. Like everything else he had been carrying that night, the white of the envelope had been smeared with crimson, but the stain wasn't as arresting as the hole. Buried halfway into the bundle was a bullet. A bullet that had passed through his chest and would have continued on into the girl he carried had it not been stopped by the thick parcel. "Blood money…redeemed." He said softly to himself before he tossed it, underhand, to Dane.

Catching it, Dane dragged the tip of his thumb over the tops of the bills before he cast a look back to Georg, and asked, "Do you think it still spends covered in vampire's blood?"

Georg laughed, but before he could respond a sound from the cot drew their immediate attention.

The little girl sighed and shifted on the bed, making the noises that all children do upon waking, before she sat up in a sudden panic. She searched the room desperately until she found Nikola seated beside her and launched into his arms. Unconsciously the dog came with her and both were once more glued to his torso. He felt hot tears pressed between her cheek and his neck, but the child did not whimper. In quiet French Nikola began to hum, a children's rhyme. The only one he knew. He rocked back and forth a moment later and worked to remember the lyrics, sung endlessly by his own mother long, long ago. He had been ill so many times in his childhood; the song came back to him gradually.

Then he smiled. He could hear the clever girl humming softly along. The tune was simple enough and when the song ended he felt her heaving breaths calm. She had to be still awake if her grip was any indication, but she was no longer trembling.

"Didn't we say he had a way with the ladies?" Georg said.

Tesla glared even as warm brown eyes met his. She searched his face, her fingers pressing against the skin around his eyes before she felt his cheeks and peered at his lips. She must have seen him in his vampiric form, he thought, how could she not have?

He gave her a benign grin to show that the teeth had been retracted and let her settle on his lap before he showed her his hands, free of claws.

Pleased, she launched forward again, hugging tightly and Nikola looked again at Georg and Dane, rolling his eyes at their mad grins and standing.

"We need to find clothes for her, and she should be bathed." He said. She still wore the blood stained night dress and he didn't want her memory of it to be any clearer than it already was.

"I think you'll be the one to wash her up, Mr. Tesla." Dane said. "There are girls her age on the floor above, I've seen them playing in the halls. I'll ask after some clothing."

Grabbing a blanket and towel Nikola stepped once more into the hallway and down its length, talking quietly to the girl whose name still remained a mystery. He had started calling her Bijou or gem while he ran warm water into the bath.

She refused to get into it. Nikola tried to coax her in with logic, then with promises. When he had finally given up and turned to the wall for answers he heard the water sloshing on the sides of the tub and a small splash.

Chastely the girl sat mostly submerged, using a bar of soap on her arms, ignoring Nikola completely.

He hadn't thought once that she might wish for privacy.

He wondered if, who he was more and more considering to be _his,_ Bijou had started growing up before, or after her mother was killed.

The girl washed every inch of her skin, including behind her ears while she hummed the song Tesla had taught her. He hummed along, keeping his eyes averted. When the humming stopped he glanced over to see finger tips, eyes, nose and hair peeking over the edge of the tub. He handed over the towel and she reached out for it, a small smile on her lips before she stood, clambered from the tub and wrapped herself, shivering, in the soft cloth.

Seconds later he felt the press of warm, damp towel against his knee and smiled down at the cloth covered dwarf. He lifted her into his lap, rubbing her shivering body through the towel until she settled again.

On cue there was a knock at the door and a pile of clothing was handed through. The deliverer was not Dane however, but a girl just a little older than Bijou, who waved at the face in the towel shyly before again closing the door.

"Perhaps you now have a friend…" Nikola said softly. He opened his arms to see if Bijou would make the effort to cloth herself. After a moment of staring at the clothing perched on the sink she slid from Tesla's lap and inspected it. A small hand peeked out through gaps in the towel to sort through the items, as if calculating a list of necessary ingredients.

Once satisfied she turned to Nikola, nodded her head once then looked to the door.

Nikola frowned and cocked his head, confused until the hand jutted out again, a small stubby finger pointing insistently.

He face burst into another grin and he acquiesced, picked up the blanket and the discarded dressing gown before leaving.

He was very surprised to see a collection of children and a concerned woman standing directly outside the door. At his startled reaction the children giggled behind cupped hands and the woman smiled.

"She is better behaved than mine." She said softly, blushing slightly when she met Tesla's eyes. "You are not as wet as I become when they bathe.." She explained.

They waited, together, for the door to open. Tesla felt awkwardly like a young boy waiting for his first date to emerge. When she did come out she promptly turned her back to Nikola, lifted wet strands of hair and waited for him to fumble with the tiny buttons along the back of the dress.

The outfit was light blue with brown flowers scattered over it. The top had puffed short sleeves and the skirt flared a little, falling just past her knees. She had white socks with lace at the top on her feet. The buttons were tedious but he managed them, refusing to look at the woman giggling at him in the corner.

The mild embarrassment meant nothing at all when he finished and Bijou turned, her eyes only for him as she held out her skirt and twirled.

"No finer beauty in the world…" He told her, whispering as if it were a secret only she was allowed to hear.

She grinned at him, pulled at his hands until his long legs bent and he was at eye level, and then sweetly pecked his cheek.

"Heart breaker…." He told her.

"I have things to put her hair up, back in the room with the men…" The woman said. She had turned already, her gaggle of children running ahead of her and into the self-same room. Nikola stopped her before she could get too far.

"I'm N-Heinrich Wietzal." He said, catching himself.

"Marga Dumonts." She said, before following her children.

They spent the rest of the day inside. There was no reason to go out. They had no performances on Sunday and Marga, who lived with her sister and four children, insisted that she was accustomed to making large meals for her brood and would gladly have them all up to her apartment for Sunday dinner.

The addition of ten hungry males was excessive in Nikola's view but the women seemed to enjoy their company, and as he noticed, his men clearly enjoyed being around the women. Dane was the only one of the older men that was not married and he especially took a liking to Marga. He insisted on helping her clear the table and stood at her side drying the dishes; even slipping clean dishes back into the dish water so that she would have to clean them again and he would have more time with her.

As the sun began to set late that afternoon Nikola sat in the main room of Marga's apartment, writing yet another letter. Bijou sat on the floor in front of him, engaged finally in the normal play of a five-year-old, stacking colorful blocks and driving toy cars around them, creating her own city. Had he brought the camera with him Nikola would have taken a photo. Georg was seated as well, working on the coding of one of the messages Nikola had dictated to him that morning.

From the kitchen Marga giggled and Dane's laugh rang out a second later.

"Have you noticed Marga?" Georg asked, not looking up from his work.

Nikola ignored the question, searching for a word to properly describe the color of Bijou's hair.

"Mister Tesla?"

It wasn't auburn, nor was it blonde. It wasn't ginger either but more the color of a sunset over water. Amber…that was the word he wanted. He wrote it down.

"Nikola…" Georg finally said. The Serbian glanced up. "That answers my question.." Georg said chuckling. "This one captures your heart…" He gestured with his pencil to Bijou, "But the grown woman in the other room, who stares at you every time you turn your head, is only another stranger."

Nikola narrowed his eyes slowly catching up to the topic of conversation before he looked toward the kitchen, the sounds of laughter and even soft communication having died.

Georg followed his gaze, leaning to one side so that he could see into the kitchen then sighed happily. "I think that might be our cue to depart."

Before Nikola could even stand Bijou was on her feet, waving hastily good bye to her new friend and standing near Tesla patiently. He was flattered at her attachment to him, but he also knew it spelled trouble, and in many different forms, for the future.

"Dinner was lovely, Marga." Georg called and heard a gasp and breathless giggle in reply.

Nikola smirked. "We'll be sending the children up in an hour," he said, waving for Marga's girl Florine to join them. In the hall Tesla watched Bijou and Florine walk to the top of the staircase, Bijou hesitating there until Nikola drew closer before she would start down the stairs, one step at a time.

Tesla mused. Had he expected this moment when he first read the mysterious invitation slipped under his door?

He felt Bijou slip a hand around his pinky and ring finger and closed his thumb against her fist. Did he think a Belgian angel would fall into his arms, literally, from above, capture his heart and leave him indecisive, tongue tied and lost? Did he think he would be happy for another man, quickly falling in love, a word that he rarely used or believed in?

No, he thought. He hadn't expected to find himself living this sort of life. He wasn't entirely sure he wanted to continue living it either but if he were given the choice to live it again, or skip it…there was no contest. If he never saw sweet Bijou's face again, or never heard Dane and the others harassing one another, or never felt the passion he did now for the end of a war that he hadn't before cared about, he would never forget.

That night, after Bijou was tucked in bed in yet another borrowed night dress, Tesla wrote to Helen. In this letter there was no pretense. No structure. No half-fabled stories purely for her entertainment. It was a confession, a promise and a question wrapped tightly in a bundle of five sentences. When he finished writing it he tore it up, and tossed the pieces onto the burning coals in the fireplace.

Maybe he wasn't yet willing to tell her everything. But at least he'd finally gained the courage to admit it to himself.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

_Old City – Present Day_

"So what did you find out about the Dumont woman?" Will asked. He had wandered into Helen's office sometime after midnight, the binder of letters from Nikola open in his hands. He'd skimmed through all three of them but the first one kept drawing him back.

"She's a photographer, a playwright, and for a brief time, was a war correspondent in Vietnam, and numerous other conflicts. Married but shortly after, her husband died and she kept her maiden name." Helen squinted at her computer screen as she spoke. She had considered taking notes about the woman as she went but her history was so memorable, her life so remarkable, she found it wasn't necessary.

"Why the hyphenation then?" Will asked.

"Adopted." Helen said. "Shortly after that photograph was taken according to her autobiography."

"Huh…" Will said, and looked down to the page he had opened. He was silent long enough to draw Helen's attention.

"What is it?" She said, and Will turned the book and set it down in front of her.

"Bijou. It's the name of a little girl Nikola keeps mentioning in his letters. He claims she is a street waif that he found to be 'more charming than the other waifs' and he throws her scraps, gives her a blanket. It's a halfhearted tale of tragedy."

"But…"

"But he spends three pages describing her the first time they meet. He's obsessive about giving an exact picture of her, like he spent a day watching her. Then weeks later she's not mentioned at all. In fact the letters stop all together until late 1946."

"He returned to England." Helen explained. "He said that he had seen tragedy that he could not bear and told us all about his massive death ray."

Will was lost, Helen realized, noting the look of confusion on his face and she thought briefly about explaining it all then waved her hand at him. "Never mind."

"The psychology doesn't fit, Magnus. Nikola writes that he came one day to the place where he normally meets Bijou and she wasn't there anymore. End of story. He dedicated a portion of every letter to her well-being up until she disappears, then says nothing about trying to find her, or being concerned for where she's gone.."

"If Nikola was in Belgium, and not in Serbia, then every word in those letters is a lie, Will." Helen said, her tone that of a teacher disappointed in the lack of cleverness in her pupils.

Will shook his head and sat down in the leather arm chair across from her desk. "No, I don't think it's all fiction either. There's too much there that someone like…well like Nikola…wouldn't be able to conjure up. There is too much depth. Think about it…he speaks with awe about a group of Belgians that are manic to defend their country. When has Nikola ever been amazed by zealots!?"

It had to have been the late hour that was making her so angry, or the entire day spent tracking through history to find a single answer for a man who never gave answers. She had been missing things, massive clues, and she'd only begun to realize it when Will came in the room. He was right, and for once had a better grasp on the most confounding man in Helen's life, than she did.

"I doubt that Bijou is her real name." Will said. "But Nikola writes that she is five. Five at the exact same time that that photograph was taken, by another five year old girl…it's a long shot."

"And an alarming coincidence." Helen said. She bit her lip and framed her cheeks with her hands for a moment, staring at her computer screen. "Elise Bronstien-Dumont is alive."

Will stared at her in shock before he rushed around behind her desk to look at the computer screen. Helen had pulled up a recent news article in a French newspaper. There was a picture of a smiling 69-year-old woman standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. The photo was professionally taken and focused closely on her sparkling, deep brown eyes. Her hair was mostly white, with a slight yellowish tint to it, cut into a pixie style that worked well with her face structure. She wore fashionable clothes and had an undeniable, confident allure to her.

The article was part of the entertainment portion of the newspaper and announced that for her 70th birthday Miss Dumont would be throwing a themed benefit ball to raise money for war orphans. The article praised her efforts in the past, talked about her latest sensational play in London, did a brief history of the woman and concluded with the writer proclaiming that there was no way that he would not attend. The article had been written three days before.

"And the benefit ball?"

"Is tomorrow night." Helen said.

"So he's gone to France after all." Will said, petulantly, after a moment of thought.

Helen flashed her eyes at him, and then rolled them. The same need that Nikola had to always be proven right had begun to manifest itself in Will as well. Some day she was going to point it out to the both of them.

They were silent, the stillness of the Sanctuary enveloping them as Helen read from her computer screen and Will stepped to the side to continue reading the letters.

Will took a deep breath and closed the book after a minute or so. He turned to watch Helen's profile then said, "You want to go…to the benefit ball. Don't you?"

Helen leaned back in her chair, clasped her hands together and stared at them, one manicured finger laying over another in perfect lines.

If Nikola knew the woman who had taken that photograph, found her to be still alive and decided to go see her…the consequences could be devastating, for both the woman and for him. She had expected Nikola to be wiser than that. Even if he had no intention of speaking to the woman, going to a place where he could be spotted, was dangerous. Something had caused him to make that decision. Something had happened that Helen wouldn't find in his letters or in the history books.

"We're going to Paris. Come on." She said, and then stood, leaving her office to pack.

* * *

_Liege, Belgium_

_March, 1943_

There was a funeral three days later for the shopkeeper and his wife. Despite rumors that they had been traitors and criminals the event was well attended. Nikola, Dane and Georg had discussed attending as well. There were risks and benefits.

Bijou did not speak and her muteness was clearly the result of trauma. She could make noise, she would hum any song that Nikola or Georg began, and was quickly learning the tunes to every song in their show. Bringing her to a funeral, even if it wasn't for the family that she had lost, might bring her some closure.

On the other hand appearing at all in connection with something that he, Heinrich Wietzel, had nothing to do with was foolhardy, and Bijou couldn't go with any of the other men because she refused to be parted from Nikola longer than an hour.

This hampered Nikola's spying capabilities, forcing him to go out only at night which reduced available light to nothing and meant taking his camera was pointless. While Bijou slept under the watchful eyes of the other men Nikola dressed in black, smudged his face with coals (something he was just barely able to accept) and learned the layout of the town from top to bottom. He watched patrol movements, pinpointed guard towers. He began to track shipments of weapons coming up the Meuse, basements and bunkers where the weapons were stashed along with a growing stash of art, jewels, gold and other manifestations of wealth.

He took extensive notes, drew maps, coded messages and wrote letters during the day in the wings of the theatre, Bijou always at his side. As he wasn't using it anymore he made her official guardian of the camera.

One afternoon, several weeks later, she came to him with the well-used black box and held it up, tears in her eyes, clearly very upset.

"Bijou?" He asked, then took the camera, rocking back on his heels when she lunged at him, wrapping around a leg. He patted her head then looked over the piece, thinking perhaps she had accidentally broken it. When he snapped the shutter closed and tried to advance the film he realized the problem.

She had been taking pictures all that time, and had finally realized she had run out of film. He grinned, and patted her head again, setting the camera down.

"Bijou, angel. It will be alright. Here, let me show you."

Vampire and angel, their heads bowed together, worked moment to moment winding the film, removing it from the back of the camera and loading it again.

"Though, you probably shouldn't do this on your own…" Nikola muttered, to himself, shutting the back of the camera before he handed it back to her. Still recovering from her tears Bijou remained with him, turning the camera in her hands, bringing it up against pudgy cheeks to look through the view finder.

They were between shows that afternoon and the rest of the troupe had left the theatre for dinner. Nikola rarely ate and Bijou usually preferred to skip lunch, eating only breakfast and dinner. He suspected that her eating habits came from the scarce food she had been given while she and her family were in hiding.

"For that matter we should talk about lighting. Without a flash bulb you have to be in good light to take a photo." He told her then looked out onto the stage. The backstage lights were lit, and the house lights were on but dimmed. Walking with one hand in Bijou's and the other free he found the light box and flipped on the reds and yellows and greens. A beige world was created on the stage and he stepped out onto it.

The moment she stepped into the light Bijou raced away from him, almost tripping in her haste to get distance. When she felt she was far enough away she whirled, brought the camera to her eye and snapped a picture.

"Lens cap." Nikola called and she jumped, grunted in frustration and whipped off the cap before snapping another picture.

He laughed, the sound echoing in the empty room. Bijou grinned at him then ran closer, stopped and snapped a picture, then run even closer. Each picture was likely to be fuzzier and more out of focus than the last, owing to her lack of attention to zoom.

When she returned to him the consummate teacher gave her another lesson.

They spent most of the afternoon learning to use the camera and that night, while the little girl slept, Nikola developed the photos she had taken. Most of them were what he would expect from the hand of a five year old. Quite a few of them had alarming clarity both in composition and in skill. Nikola put them in an envelope and tucked them into the small bag they had purchased for Bijou's growing collection of clothes. He intended to show them to her at the end of the week when she could be praised by all of the men in the group, not just him.

After breakfast was completed, the following morning, the group of men gathered, play fighting over who would walk with Bijou on his shoulders down to the theatre. In the beginning she struggled to understand that the fight for her attentions was a game and not actual conflict. The men were delighted when Bijou started to realize the advantage of men arguing over her and even affected coy flirtation, choosing one man then at the last minute changing her mind and choosing another. No matter what choice she made she would look to Nikola for approval before the deal was done.

That morning she chose Tueur. To their shock the boy grinned broadly, immediately removed the leather bag in which he kept the Luger and set it to the side, before bending to hoist the five-year-old onto his shoulders. He made no attempt to pick up the bag again and proudly led the way out of the boarding house with Bijou and her camera perched happily on top.

Dane was giggling seconds later and every eye was drawn his way.

"Marga…" He said, through tears of laughter. "She told her to choose the one with gun oil on his hands." The symmetry of what had just occurred was reflected in Georg and Nikola's eyes. Dane's new amour had already done a great deal to affect their group, her attention to Bijou and mothering love to the child was the greatest deed of all in Nikola's opinion. While Marga had clearly chosen Dane, she had the interest of all of them on her heart and Nikola saw it then.

She was a good mother. Just the sort of mother that would sacrifice her life, and risk her child even if that risk meant saving her life. Very much like the mother that had placed Bijou's life in the hands of an untrustworthy, dishonest, self-serving vampire because she knew Bijou had a better chance there, than in front of a loaded gun.

He would have to guide the child toward spending more time with Marga. He knew he was not father material. As much as he loved her, he couldn't take her with him when it all ended. And he knew, deep down, that it was going to end, and badly.

On their way to the theatre that morning Nikola walked at the back of the group, lost in his thoughts. When he felt the presence of another walking beside him he expected to see Dane or Georg's face. He was vastly displeased when he looked up to see a German uniform and a severe grin.

"Herr Wietzel."

He wanted to sneer, he hated the man in more ways than he could count, but Heinrich Wietzel didn't know that he was a cold blooded murderer. All Heinrich Wietzel knew was that he had been left sitting at a dinner table weeks ago with no explanation and an expensive bottle of wine. Following the incident Tesla assumed Kohrber had left Liege. There had suddenly been another officer directing his troops, and Nikola hadn't seen the Colonel in any of his nightly forays.

"I thought you had left this fair city, after I paid for the wine and the table at the restaurant." Nikola said, smirking, waiting for Kohrber to react to the jibe.

He had spent time thinking about the Nazi's interest in him that night at La Passerelle. At first he had considered it the beginning of the end of their cover but the more he ran over the events and conversation of that night Nikola realized, stunned, that Kohrber had been drawn to him for very different reasons. He expected Kohrber's reaction to be one of a stilted but hopeful suitor. Instead Kohrber stopped walking, swung his hands behind his back in an at-ease position and said, "We had other more important business that evening…didn't we?"

Nikola looked to the group of performers continuing down the street, feeling that familiar panic begin again. He had been smirking, and he kept the look there even as he narrowed his eyes.

"We? As in..you and I?" He asked, one long finger tilting to his chest then to Kohrber's.

The blonde's brows rose and he nodded.

"I thought we were having wine." Nikola said. His comment stopped the colonel for a moment, derailing the conversational train he'd been trying to take.

"How have you been feeling lately, Herr Wietzel?" Kohrber changed the subject, abruptly. He bent his head to look Nikola over from head to toe, waiting for a response.

Nikola drew in a breath. "Forgive me, Colonel. But I have a performance to think about, notes to prepare, and an orchestra to rehearse. If you'll excuse me." He turned and started after the group, noting that Bijou was looking back at him, twisting on Tueur's shoulders, forcing the young man to walk backwards.

"The little girl is very pretty." Kohrber said, still standing where Nikola had left him on the sidewalk. "Lovely 'amber' hair…" He said, emphasizing the word.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

_Liege, Belgium_

_March 1943_

Nikola stumbled to a halt feeling his heart seize in his chest.

"Beautiful brown eyes. So much like her mother's…were. Did you know that when a person dies a sort of film forms over the surface of their eye, and makes the color seem lighter than it had been in life?"

Nikola started walking again. He had to warn the other men. Somehow Kohrber had gotten his hands on his letters to Helen. For the sake of his deception he hadn't coded them. The arrogance of that decision it seemed, had doomed him.

"Mr. Tesla…" The Kohrber's voice called. Further away but still louder than he cared for. Ahead Bijou had begun to get upset. Already she had forced Tueur to stop walking and Hans and Dane were stopped too, turning to watch the frozen Serbian.

"I have begun to think that the accounts of your death in America are greatly exaggerated. There are also those in Berlin who wonder…" Tesla turned around to face him, watching as Kohrber slowly closed the distance between them, hands still behind his back. "How is it that a man of 80 continues to look so remarkably spry and young? The aging makeup was clever but we have eyes everywhere." The German paused, grinning in a way that reminded Nikola more of a naked and empty skull, than a human being. "I am also wondering how a normal man could possibly lose so much blood and be looking as well as you are only weeks later."

Kohrber was close to him now, far too close for comfort. He reached a hand out from behind his back, bringing it toward Nikola's face and the vampire flinched, backing up a step. "We should have found your dead body lying in that alley, Mr. Tesla. I have my suspicions as to how you accomplished this feat. Das Fuhrer however is given to more fanciful…ideas…"

He could kill him. Right there on the street. It would take seconds for him to transform, drive his nails into Kohrber's torso and drag him into the alley. String him up by his entrails and leave him as an example to every other Third Reich bastard in town. He was so taken with the idea that he was literally moments from enacting it when he heard tiny running feet behind him, Dane's voice shouting her name, Bijou's hand grasping his own.

The anger was replaced with fear in an instant and Nikola looked down at Bijou, then up to Kohrber who had begun smiling at the child. Tesla picked her up and turned his back on the blonde colonel, hurrying with Bijou back towards Dane, Tueur and Hans. He spared one glance backwards before he told them, "Walk. Get to the theatre."

They reacted to the severity of his tone and started moving immediately. Nikola couldn't read Kohrber well enough to know what the man was planning. He didn't know if Kohrber's frustration came from his personal interest in Tesla or his duty to the Fatherland.

"What did he want?" Dane asked, as if reading his thoughts.

Nikola shook his head. "I don't know. He knows who I am. He knows that I was there the night Bijou…" He cut himself off, eyes flickering to her face. Thankfully Dane had caught on.

"Worse still they know I'm a vampire…or suspect it."

"How?" Hans asked. "How could they possibly know that?"

The rest of the group had waited for them a block away and as soon as they rejoined the larger crowd of men Nikola put Bijou down and took her hand. "I have no idea. He said they have eyes everywhere. That must mean spies and undoubtedly it also means they've infiltrated more governments than we can count. The Nazi's have been planning this long before any of us have imagined…they've invaded so quickly and so powerfully-"

Nikola finally realized that the men around him were staring in confusion, not following at all. What he knew of the world and what they knew was so disparate, not only because of the differences in age, but also in experience.

In fact the words he had just spat from his mouth were shocking even to him.

Tesla turned in a circle scanning the streets. Kohrber was no longer in sight but the vampire knew he had to be close. There were uniformed soldiers everywhere, two stationed outside the post office, a few more walking down the street from where they had likely been ordered to stand on guard outside the theatre, yet more standing smoking outside a café. Strategically placed up and down the block, all doing activities that led naturally towards standing and waiting for hours; all part of a setup, a snare, a trap meant to collect Nikola.

"They want me." Nikola said quietly. It sounded self-centered and fanciful he knew, but it also made sense. It explained why Kohrber had returned to Liege after being gone for so long; even if the dinner invitation and the chase that followed hadn't been planned.

Georg pushed through the group of men. "The notes, the photos, the maps…" He said quietly.

Nikola closed his eyes, dropping his head as he remembered. "Back at the boarding house. Korhber himself set up our lodging, he'll have no trouble finding them."

A hand tapped his sleeve and Nikola looked down to see Bijou holding up her camera. He sighed and cupped her cheek in his palm. "Other photos, angel. Photos I took."

She screwed her face into a look of thoughtful concentration.

"I can go back. Or call Marga on the phone. Ask her to get them." Dane offered, not looking entirely pleased with the idea even as he offered it.

"No…no, we can't pull her into this. Kohrber mustn't know that Marga or her family are in any way connected with us. In fact it would be best Dane, if you got her and her children and her sister out of Belgium altogether." Tesla looked around again, noted the addition of two more soldiers to the collection of eight already on the street. Up ahead was the fountain, the same place where they had held their first impromptu performance.

"Sing…start singing. The series of drinking songs, and head for the fountain." Tesla told them. They stared at him wide eyed; barely comprehending what was becoming all too clear to Tesla. The vampire bent to pick up Bijou again and started the first verse, nodding that the men should join him. As their voices rose into the air he led the way to the fountain and they immediately began to draw a crowd.

Georg broke off from the group his voice falling silent while he moved to walk beside Nikola. "What are we doing, Mr. Tesla? Why do we draw attention to ourselves? To the little girl?"

"We're drawing a crowd." Nikola told him, his voice dropping in volume so that neither of them would be heard over the strong singing voices of the group.

Georg opened his mouth to ask another question, and Tesla could see the frustration building in the man's face. "This mission is over…" Tesla said. "It ended the moment I decided to toy with the enemy instead of defeating him. All of you must leave. All of you must escape. There is another mission, one heading to Huy, if you could escape and join them you might have a chance."

"You don't know that! You can't know that!"

"I am decades older than you, Georg. I have seen the end of battles more times in my life than I care to admit and I have lost so often I hardly know what it is to win. Here, with this remarkable group of freedom fighters I can do nothing but threaten your lives. There might be another way that I can help but I can't do that until I know…" He stopped and met Bijou's eyes then forced himself to look away. "_All _of you are safe."

He set Bijou down and she immediately grasped his hand again, but he stopped her, gently pulled her hand away and kissed it before he knelt in front of her.

"Bijou…angel." He said, and then felt his soul tear. It was happening too fast, this good bye. He had known that it would happen but he hadn't planned for it to be while he was still so hopelessly in love. He fought the darkness swarming into his heart and pulled the child into a crushing hug that had to have been painful for her, but she didn't pull away. "I want to you take pictures. Lots of them." He said to her cheek, to give her something else to do, to think about. "But I want you to keep that camera hidden, and I want you to stay with Georg."

He felt her head shaking against him and he pushed her back so that he could meet her eyes. "Bijou." He said, and took her cheeks in his hands. "I…love you..deeply. So does Georg, and Dane, and Marga. I have to go away and I can't take you with me."

"Do you love me?" He asked her.

She nodded, tears brimming in her eyes.

"Do you like it when we're happy?"

She nodded again, her lips trembling, a tear rolling down her cheek.

"I will be happy for the rest of my very…very long life," He said, smiling bitterly, "if I know that you are safe. And you will be safe if you stay with Marga, and Georg will get you to her. I will miss you and I promise I will come to visit you when this terrible fighting is over, but for now you have to be brave, and smart and strong."

Tears streamed down her cheeks, her fingers white as she clutched at the camera hanging from its strap around her neck.

"More soldiers." Georg said simply, regretting the necessary interruption.

"Will you do that for me?" Nikola asked, his thumbs busily wiping her tears away. When she finally nodded he pressed his lips fiercely to her forehead then stood. With a short breath he shifted his shoulders, straightened the lapels of the blue wool coat that he had grown rather fond of and nodded to himself, his decision finally made..

"Georg…" He said, the men's voices continuing in the background. Without being told they had launched into another of the favorites that they had performed together, playing to the crowd as it grew. They had been joined by a street performer as well, a man with a squeeze box and his son, playing haphazardly along with the tunes that he recognized.

"Take the men." Nikola said. "Two…three at a time. Use the crowd, have them slip away." He reached into his jacket, split a thinly sewn seam, and pulled out a roll of bills, then another, then a third and fourth. He had been saving them, skimming off the top of the funds that the Liege counsel had been paying them. There wasn't enough there for his purposes, not hardly, but there was enough to help get the people he was now responsible for out of harm's way.

Georg stared in confusion at the money he was being handed.

"Take some of it for Marga and her family. It is imperative that all of them, including Bijou, escape tonight. They want me, these Nazi sons of bitches, who wouldn't want an unstoppable vampire? They'll get me, but only long enough for you to get out."

Nikola looked away, scanning the ever increasing crowd, craning to see above their heads as he counted soldiers. Kohrber had joined the group, grinning, standing at the rear of the crowd with his hands behind his back.

"Can you do it?" Nikola asked, turning back to Georg. Dane had worked his way through the singers so that he could hear what Nikola was saying. He turned, his voice falling silent long enough to nod agreement to Tesla, and elbow Georg into responding before going back to the lyric.

Georg quickly pocketed the money, fumbling and handing some of it to Dane before he reached a hand out to the vampire. "It's been an…"

"No…no it hasn't been an honor, Georg…it's been a privilege, for me. Take care of yourselves. Take care of her…" Nikola said, shaking hands with the man.

"What are you going to do?" Georg asked.

"Me?" Nikola smirked, backing away three steps to the base of the fountain and winking down at Bijou. She gave him the tiniest of smiles through her tears and Nikola felt some of the darkness clearing away. "I'm going to sing." He said.

He opened his mouth to begin another song, making his voice loud enough to be heard over the applause that had come for the previous number. The squeeze box player standing nearby took a moment before he recognized the song and tried to play along. When Tesla noticed Bijou lifting the camera to her face he struck a pose, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Do I want to be with you? As the years come and go? Only forever, if you care to know.." The song he sang was American, a popular favorite sung most famously by Bing Crosby. He hated the music, especially given that he had first heard it in a film a few years ago, a film that was shown using technology that he used to hold patents for. But he had always admired the voice of the singer.

"Would I grant all your wishes, and be proud of the task? Only forever, if someone should ask."

It was one of the mysteries of humanity that he couldn't fathom, that a person remembered better a song that they hated, rather than a song that they loved. As he sang on and the attention turned to him he saw Dane and Georg weave backward into the crowd, Bijou with them. They moved out like a spider's web, getting the attention of each of the men, quickly divulging the plan, working their way to the edge of the mass of people.

"How long would it take me, to be near if you beckoned. Offhand I figure, less than a second."

Most of the troupe was soon at the corner of the crowd, positioned such that he would have to turn his head to check on their progress. He had no choice but to ignore them, not daring to bring attention to them by looking their way. Get her free, and keep her safe, he thought.

He said his final goodbye as he sang, "Do you think I'll remember,"

Kohrber cocked his head to the side, his eyes still focused entirely on Tesla. The arrogant pig thought that Tesla was singing to him. Nikola's eyes glinted and he stepped away from the fountain as he sang the next phrase, pacing through the crowd that parted for him. The squeeze box player tried to follow but was quickly crowded out.

"How you looked when you smiled…"

There were soldiers to the left and right of Kohrber, more behind him, even more on either side of the street.

Nikola stopped singing ten feet from the Colonel. As the squeezebox player finished the song, Tesla transformed himself slowly, letting the nails grow centimeter by centimeter, his eyes bleeding into black, his teeth sharpening to a deadly sheen.

"I plan to remember you Colonel," He said, his voice deeper, the mask slipping so that there was no question whatsoever that he spoke with hatred and disgust as he addressed the murderer in front of him. Not only Kohrber, but his men and the crowd around them reacted to Tesla's transformation, some of them backing hurriedly away. The soldiers lifted their weapons, uncertain, their eyes traveling to their commanding officer who seemed just as surprised and unsure as they were.

"…long after I've killed you." Tesla promised. He grinned at the prospect then lunged forward. Kohrber jumped several feet back in the same moment reaching for his weapon even as he shouted, "Nien, Nien!" to his soldiers. He couldn't be heard over the sudden explosion of gunfire. Untouched Kohrber stared down at the body at his feet, ignoring the screams of the shocked crowd around him, or the looks of hatred being sent his way.

If the Fuhrer was right the man wouldn't stay dead for long, but it was clear that Kohrber could no longer remain in this part of the country. He had just murdered a beloved performer before a crowd of witnesses. He would have to take the vampire and return to France, and hope that the man Hitler found to be so valuable, would actually wake up.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

_Paris, France_

_Present Day_

The walkway under the Eifel Tower had been brightly lit, the struts of the magnificent structure decorated with strings of lights, bright sways of cloth and thousands of helium balloons. A grandstand had been erected near the northern struts, a band shell in keeping with the time period on which Miss Dumont had decided. The waiters and waitresses passing out champagne, taking drink orders and serving hors d'oeuvres were wearing black and white period outfits as well, transforming the historic spot into its 1947 counterpart.

Every guest had been urged to dress appropriately. Those guests in the military were invited to come in historic uniforms; others were asked to wear formal attire from the period. Even the sound equipment, and the microphone in the gloved hand of the band singer, was appropriate to the time.

As Helen handed their tickets to security and walked with Will around the thick bushes that hid the soiree she couldn't stop the gasp. It was remarkable, the detail and work that had gone into a simple theme for a ball.

The gown she wore was one of her own. A salmon color that was lighter on top than it was on the bottom. The bodice was satin and loose, two panels of fabric that narrowed at her shoulders, widened, then narrowed again to meet the intricately beaded hexagon at her waist. The skirt was comprised of layers of thin fabric, long enough to drag on the ground that flared a little as she walked. Her dark brown hair was partially piled on top of her head in tight curls, the rest left to fall against her mostly bare shoulders.

She had dressed and prepared her hair and makeup herself, getting lost in the memories.

At her insistence, Will wore a uniform. Formal, American Airborne. Though she had only seen his grandfather briefly, Helen imagined that Will was the exact image of the late Capt. Jack Zimmerman. The dark greenish tan fit him well, and she had enjoyed watching him attempt to tame his hair into the slicked-down look once popular.

They blended into the crowd quickly, snagging tall flutes of champagne. Neither said a word but both were looking for one man. The vampire they had traveled over 4,000 miles to find. Before they could find him however the band finished the tune it had been playing. The singer bowed politely relinquishing the mike to a tuxedoed gentleman who thanked her, thanked the band and asked for their attention.

All of this was done in French and Helen checked with Will as the man spoke to make sure that he understood.

The man cracked a joke about aging, reminded them that the event they were celebrating was the birthday of a seventy year old that hardly looked a day over fifty-five, and to thunderous applause introduced, "…Miss Elise Bronstien-Dumont!"

Helen and Will joined in the applause as she walked onto the stage. She looked younger than fifty-five, Helen thought, oddly mildly jealous. Her short hair had been coifed back and up, the gown she wore looked very much like something Ginger Rogers would've danced in. Elise gave her hand to the man who introduced her, thanked him with a curtsy and turned to the microphone.

Brown eyes danced across the crowd of people before she stepped forward and put a gloved hand to the stand.

"In 1947 I was nine years old. I had been in Paris with Marga Dumont, my adoptive mother, for almost four years. Most of that time we had been here in secret but I was already in love with the city. My mother would take me out some mornings for a little exercise and we would come here, to this very spot. I would stand there in the middle…" She said pointing to the center of what would soon be the dance floor.

Standing at the back Helen could see the spot without having to turn and she looked at it, imagining a nine-year-old Elise there in pig tails and saddle shoes. A moment later she felt a jolt of electricity when she recognized the back of the head she had been staring at.

"…look up at the complex construction of this magnificent sculpture, and spin." Elise giggled at the memory of herself.

"I would spin and spin until I was dizzy and wonder…if the world was constantly turning how was it that the Eifel Tower never got dizzy?" She paused as her audience chuckled.

"One morning my mother called me, 'Bijou!' She said, 'Why do you like the tower so much?'"

Elise paused, her smile small and coquettish and moving at the same time.

"I told her, 'I want to know what it is to stand tall, and proud and never be moved.' My adoptive mother was an amazing woman. And when I was old enough she also told me about my true mother. About the sacrifice that she, a Jewess, was forced to make to save my life. We often talked about the men that brought me to her, sacrificing their freedoms, and some of them…" She paused again, her face tightening only slightly before she continued. "Many of them, losing their lives. Some of them had families. And when I realized that there were other children out there, who were lost without parents to love them, or someone to save them, I decided that I would help them."

There was a crash of applause that Elise neither reacted to nor ignored. She stopped speaking as though she knew it would happen and waited for it to die. "I ask that you give all you can tonight. Our recent wars, and worse, the attacks of terrorists have ripped children from their parents so suddenly that we cannot hope to save them without your help. The price you paid for your ticket was your first donation. I hope you are able to give even more. Thank you." There was more applause and Elise smiled and nodded her head in acceptance before she walked off the stage.

As the applause died and the band began to play again Helen grabbed Will's arm and pointed at the crowd. As they spread apart, Tesla easily stood out. He stood almost fifty feet away but Helen could see that he had his hair slicked back instead of radiating from his head as usual. The tuxedo he wore fit his frame, the jacket short in front and narrowing to tails in the back. She could see that he had on a bowtie as he turned, searching the crowd, indecisive and nervous.

She knew exactly how he felt. She felt it too. A moment later she knew she had been seen. Tesla's eyes came to rest on her and she wished desperately that she could have recorded the moment, and the look of astonishment on his face. She smiled despite herself and blushed.

Tesla's head tilted to the side, an amused smile on his lips, as if to say, 'You figured it out." Helen shrugged and nodded, glanced toward Will to find him staring at her like he thought she was insane, then looked back to Tesla who was now laughing at her. She glared and he sobered then looked back to the base of the bandstand where Elise stood accepting birthday wishes from a handful of guests.

Helen watched her as well then looked back to Tesla. The smile had disappeared and he was unsure again. Helen took a deep breath and after a moment she nodded.

Tesla swallowed, rather theatrically, and then straightened his jacket against his shoulders, something he always did when he was preparing to do something that scared the hell out of him. Beside her, Will shifted.

"Wha-..is he gonna?"

"Yes, he is." Helen said with a soft smile watching was Nikola crossed the floor. He gave a nearly imperceptible nod to the band director before he stopped behind a large woman who was exuberantly patting Elise on the shoulder.

Helen watched, desperately wishing she could be there, but she consoled herself. She wasn't going to leave Paris without Nikola on her private plane and she _would_ get a thorough explanation out of the Serbian.

* * *

The band ended their first song, then began another. The first strains of "Only Forever" came from the brass section as Nikola, feeling every part of his 154-year-old body start to fall apart, stepped toward Bijou. Grown up, Bijou. Still alive, not dead and perished and gone, but successful, loved, talented and very much alive, Bijou.

He didn't think she would remember him but he bowed slightly and kissed her gloved hand. He didn't know what to say to her but he wished her a happy birthday in hesitant and rusty French. He was about to tell her how lovely she looked when she stepped forward and threw her arms around him, dragging him into a hug that cracked his spine, stole his breath and reawakened a part of his soul he had forgotten he still had.

"I knew it was true. I remembered what they said about you. Dane, he told me, even as you lay there that you weren't really dead." She whispered, and Tesla could feel tears again, against his neck.

She released him, pulling back, grinning broadly even as she continued to cry. "It's alright that you never came back. It _is!_" She insisted, raising a hand and cupping it against the speechless man's jaw. "When I grew up I thought it was foolish to believe in such things as…such _people_ as you…I was good with the camera, and I loved the stage. Those were things you gave me and it was enough." She smiled and laughed and kissed his cheek, then rubbed at the lipstick stain.

"When I submitted that photo, for the book, a part of me thought…'if he is alive, maybe he will see this, maybe he'll know'. "

Already there was a long line of people, all waiting to greet the birthday girl. The song the band was playing was slowly coming to an end, but the band leader turned them around at the coda, focused on Elise and the drama unfolding below where he stood.

Elise looked to the line, then back to Nikola, laughing again. This would be a brief encounter between them and they both knew it. "Now that you know my name, there's one thing I want to know." She said, taking his hands in hers. "You aren't Heinrich Wietzel, are you?" She asked.

Nikola shook his head, squeezed her hands and pulled her back into a hug. She laughed squeezing him tightly. "I hoped not. What a stupid name." She said.

When she pulled away she grinned at him, accepting the handkerchief he offered her. There was a silent promise between them that they would meet again, then Nikola turned away, strangely satisfied. The band leader finally ended the song and started another. A slow waltz.

A woman clad gloriously in pink stood waiting for him only a short distance away and as always he found he couldn't resist her.

Quietly they moved together, his arm around her waist; her hand perched on his shoulder, their faces close together until she laid her head against his neck. He closed his eyes, letting the music wash over him as they moved slowly to the beat, and felt Helen sigh.

And they danced.

* * *

**I will admit to having way too much fun writing this. **

**I am a librarian and I came across a book on the Holocaust called "Beyond Courage". Flipping through I was astounded when I noticed the picture that I used as my book cover. Spitting image of J-Yo, thought I, and a germ of an idea started to grow in my head. **

**In doing my slap-dash research I discovered a list of Special Operations missions that occured in Belgium. One of them was named Badger, was sent in connection with another mission called Griffon, and supposedly ended unsuccessfully. The simple note says, "Agent deemed irresponsible". **

**From then on I took a ton of liberties. **

**I greatly appreciate my readers and reviewers, especially those not from the US who have put up with my horrible attempts at writing French. **

**Gunney**


End file.
